Prosecutors say the defendant met his victim, a 43-year-old German mechanic, on an online dating site a few hours before the September slaying, the German news agency dpa reported. The trial at a Berlin state court, which is expected to last until mid-October, is not the first of its kind in Germany. In 2006, a German court convicted Armin Meiwes of murder and disturbing the peace for killing and eating a man he had met online. A German police officer was convicted of murder in 2015 for killing a man he met in an internet chat forum devoted to cannibalism. Prosecutors said the victim had fantasized about being eaten, but there was no evidence the suspect actually did so.

Source: ABC News August 10, 2021 08:55 UTC