In Wahrheit - In einem anderen Leben (2021)

At night on a deserted country road, a truck collides with a man who suddenly steps into its path. The driver stops immediately and finds the man dying. Since there is nothing more he can do for him, he leaves him in the adjacent woods and drives on. Flashback: A report is filed with the police in Saarlouis by Barbara Falk. She was attacked in her home, drugged with knockout drops, and raped while her husband was away on a school trip to Poland. Detective Markus Zerner conducts the initial interview and has evidence collected. Because the victim’s memory has gaps and not enough foreign DNA is found, there are few leads for a promising investigation. The next day, Barbara Falk recalls a remark made by the attacker that suggests he hates women. So Detective Judith Mohn and her colleague Freddy Breyer look into old cases with a similar modus operandi. They come across a case in Saarbrücken from several months earlier. Mohn and Breyer visit Melek Ergün, but she refuses to cooperate because she does not want to be reminded of the traumatic events. Research at the police station responsible for the case at the time, headed by Mirco Hambach, points to a rather sloppy investigation by his colleagues. But Judith Mohn does not give up easily. She tries to retrace Melek Ergün’s route on the night of the attack and discovers areas where there are surveillance cameras. This leads to a suspect: Lenny Haas. Haas is arrested and questioned. He denies all the allegations, and they cannot prove that he attacked Barbara Falk. Moreover, inconsistencies begin to emerge: there are no signs of a break-in at the house, and Falk is apparently suffering from depression, for which she takes psychiatric medication. When confronted with this, Falk, who is visibly traumatized—a fact that no one but Mohn seems to notice—withdraws her statement. As a result, the investigation into Barbara Falk’s case is closed. This leads to the victim’s psychological collapse, and Falk enters an inpatient treatment facility. One day, she disappears from there and is found hanged in the woods during a major search. Detective Mohn cannot let go of the case, which ended with the victim’s suicide. At the same time, there is a murder case with certain parallels, which was very likely intended to be a rape but ended in the victim’s murder. The search for a pattern that might explain how the perpetrator selected his victims leads to a moving company. This accounts for the lack of signs of forced entry, since the customers had entrusted their house keys to the movers. Arno Biewer is then strongly suspected, but the evidence against him is still insufficient to charge him. Five years later, a man’s body is found during forestry work. Initial signs point to a collision with a truck. More significant, however, is the fact that the victim is Arno Biewer. Detective Mohn takes an interest in the matter and asks Biewer’s mother to hand over his “belongings.” Among them is a box containing numerous keys, including one to Barbara and Oliver Falk’s house. Further evidence now conclusively proves that Biewer was the perpetrator—but for Barbara Falk, it is five years too late. During all that time, Falk’s husband was unable to overcome his own trauma and grief. To change that, and not stand by helplessly as Biewer was released, he had gone after the man who had driven his wife to her death some time earlier and forced him to confess to his crimes. Biewer managed to escape, but ran into the path of the truck. Oliver Falk was sentenced to one year and four months in prison for kidnapping, unlawful imprisonment, and illegal possession of a firearm. The sentence was suspended.