Horrifying details

Double murderer kills two women with 175 stab wounds

The 54-year-old Swiss woman (pictured left) was the double murderer’s first victim.(Bild: Krone KREATIV/Claudio Thoma, Sepp Pail, zVg)

“Like a pressure cooker that’s bound to explode at some point”—that’s how the court psychiatrist vividly described a double murderer of women at the Graz Regional Criminal Court. More than four years after the two bloody crimes, the now 27-year-old Romanian is standing trial again in Switzerland. The “Krone” knows the background.

The horror begins in January 2022, shortly after 7 a.m., in a Zurich apartment. A man born in Romania (now 27 years old) grabs a knife from a kitchenette and stabs his acquaintance, who is sleeping in bed. Until the blade falls from his hand.

Continued with a second blade
According to the Swiss newspaper “Blick,” the well-built young man grabbed a second knife and repeatedly stabbed the 54-year-old woman with it. Again and again. Until the blade broke off the handle! The medical examiner later counted a total of 39 stab and cut wounds. Then the perpetrator grabbed a rolling pin and beat his dying victim with it. Experts refer to this as “excessive killing.”

That same day, the young woman-killer took a train to Graz—and murdered again about two weeks later. Using a pair of scissors, he stabbed a 41-year-old woman he had just met 136 times. Another case of absolute “overkill.” His motive: “hatred of women.”

The 54-year-old Swiss woman (pictured left) was the double murderer’s first victim.(Bild: Krone KREATIV/Claudio Thoma, Sepp Pail, zVg)

It was a truly horrific crime. You are confronted with the depths of human depravity and gruesome images.

Grazer Staatsanwältin warnt Geschworene beim ersten Prozess.

At the first trial in May 2023 at the Graz Regional Criminal Court, the renowned forensic psychiatrist Adelheid Kastner testified that the double murderer was “like a pressure cooker that is bound to explode at some point.” She found only “a few functional aspects” in his personality. The logical verdict: life imprisonment and commitment to a forensic-therapeutic center.

An additional 18 years could be added to the life sentence
Starting Wednesday, more than four years after the two shocking murders, the young Romanian will now face trial again (in absentia) at the Zurich District Court. The federal indictment speaks of “no emotional response” and claims he displayed “extraordinary cruelty.”

The prosecutor is seeking an additional 18 years in prison for the murder of the 54-year-old woman. So if the 27-year-old, who ultimately killed two women with a total of 175 stab wounds, were ever to be released from prison here, he would have to serve the second sentence in Switzerland...