Citation

Saulich MF, Kolzer SC, Held H, Verhoff MA, Plenzig S. Arch. Kriminol. 2017; 240(5-6): 200-211.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2017, Verlag Schmidt-Romhild)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The Gesellschaft zur Qualitatssicherung in Hotels (GQH), a company providing a hotel criminal investigation service, estimates that approximately 650 deaths per year occur in hotels across Germany. In the literature, there is a lack of verified data in regard to current numbers or regional differences in this respect. Inspired by an earlier study published in 2010 by the Institute of Legal Medicine in GieBen, Germany, we decided to address this deficit by systematically reviewing autopsy reports from the Institute of Legal Medicine in Frankfurt for hotel deaths and by comparing the findings with the study from GieBen. All case files for autopsies performed at our institute between 1994 and 2015 in which death had been recorded as having occurred in a hotel or a bed-And-breakfast in southern Hesse were retrospectively selected using our proprietary forensik<8 program and reviewed. The cases were evaluated for sex of the decedent, manner and cause of death, details about the manner of death recorded on the death certificate, and location of the hotel. Deaths that had occurred in the Frankfurt metropolitan area were compared with those from the environs and with the published data for the study material from GieBen. Additional focus was placed on cases in which death had been unnatural. Of the, in total, 102 cases evaluated in this study, 19 decedents were female and 83 were male. At 78, the number of unnatural deaths was higher than that of natural deaths, which numbered 16. In eight cases, the cause of death could not be conclusively determined, despite autopsy. Six of the unnatural deaths were homicides, 18 were presumed suicides, 4 were considered accidents, and the remaining 50 (without suicides) were due to drug overdoses. Seventy-eight percent of these 102 hotel deaths were recorded as having occurred within Frankfurt. Hence, while the sex ratio was similar in all the study groups, unnatural deaths occurred predominantly in urban Frankfurt (83 %). The death certificates attested an unknown cause of death in 62 cases and an unnatural cause of death, or indication for such, in 11 cases. An unnatural death could be confirmed for all of the latter cases. Compared to the sex ratio for all autopsies performed in the review period (65 % male decedents) the sex ratio for decedents who had died in hotels showed a preponderance of males, namely 81 %. Although, according to data from the Statistisches Landesamt Hessen (Hessian Statistical Office), only roughly 42 % of all overnight guests in southern Hesse were registered in urban Frankfurt in 2015, our study revealed that 78 % of hotel deaths in southern Hesse had occurred there. Considering that the leading cause of death was drug-related, the proximity to Frankfurt's main station district, which is infamous in this regard, may be a possible explanation.

Language: de

Keywords

Drug deaths; Hotel; Manner of death