German Super Recogniser case hits the news

Police's super-eye discovers wanted thief

The Stuttgart police have unusual talents – they recognize the faces of people they have seen in search photos. To the displeasure of a fugitive offender. 

The 34-year-old should not have passed the police headquarters at the Pragsattel in the light rail. However, he had no idea that a specialist of the police would board the U-15 train in the direction of Stammheim that late evening. One with a special eye for people. A so-called super-recogniser. 

The fact that the Stuttgart police have about 70 talents, who can memorize faces particularly well and recognize them in any situation, has once again paid off. A 36-year-old traffic route investigator had been working with the traffic police for a long time when he was on a light rail in the north of Stuttgart shortly after 10 p.m. on Thursday. But then everything immediately returned to duty.

Talent search with help from London

A 34-year-old man, whose image was registered in the police search systems, was sitting on the train and had been put out for arrest. The person concerned, who had not begun his sentence for theft, immediately suspected evil when he noticed the eyes of another resting on him. Already at the next stop, at the level of Sieglestraße in Feuerbach, he tried to get up and away – and escape in the darkness of the industrial area of Feuerbach.

Why could he be recognized in the first place? In February 2018, the Stuttgart police had participated in a project in which officers were sought who have a special memory. The facial features can memorize themselves so well within seconds that they would still recognize the affected persons after years in a crowd. The Metropolitan Police in London has had a special unit of such super-re-recognizers for years – and together with a scientist from the University of Greenwich, the Stuttgarters were looking for talent in their own ranks. With success.

The fugitive has a knife with him

In September 2019, for example, a Stuttgart super-recogniser, also in the evening, had tracked down an EC card thief in Zuffenhausen, whom he had met by chance on the sidewalk. And the 34-year-old in the current case had no chance either. "The colleague is a very good runner," said police spokeswoman Monika Ackermann. He sprinted behind the fugitive, several hundred meters to the Magirusstraße. There the man gave up. "He then also released his knife," says spokeswoman Ackermann. The 34-year-old, who is known to police with offences across the Criminal Code, then began his sentence.