Body of Missing 13-Year-Old Vietnamese Girl Found in Germany

Police officers in the state of Brandenburg, northeastern Germany, received a call at noon on November 8 from a resident in the Altglietzen area of Bad Freienwalde reporting an intruder inside an unoccupied property.

Upon arriving at the scene, officers discovered the teenager’s body alongside a critically injured man inside the house, according to an announcement from the Berlin Police Department. The neighborhood is home to approximately 400 residents, situated about 50 kilometers from Berlin.

Michael Petzold, spokesperson for the Berlin Public Prosecutor’s Office, confirmed that the body found was Lisa Ta, the 13-year-old Vietnamese girl who had been missing since November 3. The man inside the house was arrested and transported to a hospital for emergency treatment. The suspect sustained injuries from a self-inflicted gunshot wound and remains in critical condition. Authorities believe he abducted and killed Lisa. Petzold declined to provide detailed information regarding the suspect’s injuries or Lisa’s cause of death.

The homicide division of the Berlin State Criminal Police Office, in coordination with the Brandenburg Police Department, gathered forensic evidence at the scene on the evening of November 8 and continues to investigate.

Lisa left her home on Golliner Straße for school at around 7:15 AM on November 3. Before heading out, she snapped a photo, sent it to a classmate, and arranged to meet at a bus stop to catch the 7:30 AM bus from Barnimplatz to her school on Sella-Hasse-Straße.

German police’s missing person notice for Lisa Ta. Photo: German Criminal Police

However, Lisa’s phone lost signal roughly three minutes after she left home. Surveillance cameras along the street near her house were out of order, yielding no usable footage.

Both family members and police ruled out the possibility of Lisa running away voluntarily, prompting authorities to issue a missing person advisory, conduct door-to-door neighborhood inquiries, and deploy helicopters and sniffer dogs.

An Altglietzen resident recounted that on the day Lisa vanished, a car bearing Berlin license plates had been parked for hours outside the house with its hazard lights flashing. Other neighbors reported hearing cries for help in recent days, but no one alerted the authorities.

Police cordon off the crime scene. Photo: DPA

According to Petzold, following the missing person report, police mobilized more than 100 officers for the search. However, investigators had found no clues indicating she might be in Bad Freienwalde, a city located near the Polish border. The search effort had focused primarily on Berlin’s Marzahn-Hellersdorf district and adjacent zones in Brandenburg state.

Key aspects of the case remain under investigation, including the sequence of events, time of death, and the suspect’s identity and motive. Should the suspect succumb to his injuries, critical questions could remain unanswered, and criminal proceedings against him would typically be closed.