AMSTERDAM — An 18-year-old man suspected of stabbing a Dutch lawyer to death in Doetinchem last week was arrested in a forested area near the German town of Anholt on Saturday.

The suspect was taken to the police station in Borken for questioning and the Dutch public prosecutor’s office has requested his extradition to the Netherlands, newspaper De Telegraaf reported.

The man had been sighted on Friday in Anholt — just across the eastern Dutch-German border near the suspect’s home town of Gendringen in the Netherlands — and 20 German and Dutch police closed in on him after finding some of his personal effects in the forest.

The 18-year-old is accused of stabbing a 32-year-old lawyer to death in a law firm’s office in Doetinchem. The victim, identified as Machiel Pul, suffered multiple stab wounds and was the first Dutch lawyer to have been killed on duty.

A motive for the murder remains unclear, but the suspect has been identified as the son of a married couple presently in the midst of divorce proceedings. Pul was the lawyer of the suspect’s mother and a financial conflict has been suggested as a possible cause of the murder.

The victim was stabbed to death at the solicitor’s firm Grootjans at about 4pm on Thursday. The male suspect allegedly fled on foot and was later seen at the train station in Doetinchem. Police had initially hoped he would turn himself in.

[Copyright Expatica News 2004]

Subject: Dutch news