by Christina Harland

Firecrackers in mailboxes, smashed windows, students beaten up: violent young people have been up to mischief in the Kronsberg district of Hanover for a good two and a half years. Exactly there. Built as a model project for Expo 2000, the district has always been considered natural and family-friendly. Multiculturalism and educated middle class work well together. Problems with difficult young people, family feuds, that had happened a good ten years ago, but the situation had calmed down again. Kronsberg was never a problem district, emphasizes SPD district mayor Bernd Rödel, and it is still not a hotspot for juvenile delinquency. From the point of view of many residents, however, the violence is escalating, with around 15 to 20 young people dying in the neighborhood for a good two and a half years.

“Politics do nothing”

Family man Olaf Thiele shows next to his front door. They blew up two mailboxes one after the other with firecrackers. They flew meters away. A firecracker banged against the kitchen window just a week ago on Friday. The hole is outlined in black. In the summer, a firecracker flew through the open kitchen window. Since then there has been a burn mark on the floor. Thiele is annoyed: “You can imagine the family sitting at the table, it rattles, everyone is afraid at first. That’s very uncomfortable. We’re just angry because we notice that young people are doing more and more and politicians aren’t doing anything.” In Thiele’s neighborhood alone, a dozen mailboxes are said to have been blown up since New Year’s Eve. Thiele points to a smashed kitchen window in the neighborhood says the youths attacked the window with wooden slats.Several neighbors have since moved away because they no longer feel safe.One said his patio door had been kicked in three times.

Juvenile delinquency worries local residents

Freya Markovis shows on her front door that young people entered on Halloween. Her husband and a neighbor held her until the police arrived. The children’s parents respond with ads. Thiele also experienced this when he held a boy on Halloween who had held a blank gun in his face. First came the scolding father, then the ad. A youth reports how he was threatened and beaten by youths over the years. Boys he knew from elementary school. Wheelchair users from a Diakonie-WG across from the district center tell that the boys keep throwing firecrackers in their direction. They are afraid and do not feel protected. A man who lives around the corner shows a small plastic bucket with around 100 blank cartridges. He will have seen youngsters shoot them up on his street one evening. His children picked them up.

Further information

This was the result of the fourth dark field study by the Ministry of the Interior. She looks particularly at intimate partner violence. more

Teens need boundaries and help

Freya Markovis says that she and her husband immediately filed a complaint about property damage to the broken front door. They also worry about their children. The ten-year-old son, who is so independent in himself, no longer dares to go home from training alone. Nevertheless: “I am convinced that those who do most nonsense are not criminals. They were left behind, by Corona or before. Of course, you need borders, but above all you have to work with them, not against them. Olaf Thiele also sees it this way: “Many young people just don’t know what to do on the weekend evenings. If they go to the IGS here, they don’t even get a train ticket to go into town. They hang here in the district and there are no offers. Everything is closed here on Friday and Saturday.”

School is not part of the problem

The headmistress of the IGS Kronsberg thinks that there are not enough offers for young people in the district.

The headmistress of the IGS Kronsberg, Kathleen Fleer, says that she heard for the first time at a citizens’ dialogue in December how much many residents in the district feel threatened. However, they cannot report any rioting students in their school. However, she observed that many students were in real need as a result of the pandemic, saw no prospects and did not feel heard: “When we talk to the young people who break the rules, we notice that they are also full of pain, that they too Often the parents don’t provide the support and don’t take responsibility as we would like.” She also sees that there are too few offers for the young people and that there is a lack of meaningful employment.

The city of Hanover has a good infrastructure

Rita Maria Rzyski, youth department head of the city of Hanover, agrees that young people lack prospects and employment. But she thinks the offer in the district itself is good, pointing to all-day offers in schools and sports clubs and youth facilities. But she concedes that there are no “informal meeting places”, places where children and young people can be among themselves, without adult guidance and without memberships. The city now wants to work on this with the actors in the neighborhood. Unfortunately, there is no money for real neighborhood management After all, street social workers from other parts of the city should now be temporarily seconded to the Kronsberg.

Daily police patrols at Kronsberg

The police are now more present in the district, patrol daily and every 14 days there are consultation hours in front of the district center. “Of course, entering into dialogue is also one of those things, to increase the sense of security and to clarify questions about what residents can do and what the police can do,” says Dennis Schmitt, press spokesman for the Hanover police department. In conversations with three of his colleagues last Wednesday evening, dozens of concerned citizens vented their thoughts.

Residents want to fight for their neighborhood

A woman tells an official of the great spirit of optimism, quality of life and sense of community when the first families moved into the district around the turn of the millennium. Now she fears everything will break down. The police officer’s comment that the violence is much more serious in other parts of the city does not reassure people dying on Kronsberg. They don’t want to let it get to the point where they simply accept the destructiveness and violence in their neighborhood. Many stay together for a long time and discuss whether it has been dark and cold for a long time. They say they want to fight for their neighborhood. And about every single young person.

Further information

The police accuse him of at least ten criminal offenses. He is said to have devastated the primary school in Embsen, among other things. (01/20/2023) more

Firecrackers were thrown at the players and spectators during the game between TV Metjendorf and Schwarz-Weiß Oldenburg II. (29.11.2022) more

According to the police and prosecutors, the teenager is said to have started four robbery offenses this year alone. (29.11.2022) more

The suspects in the case of a killed 15-year-old from Salzgitter are 13 and 14 years old. That is what the law provides. (11/15/2022) more

This was the result of the fourth dark field study by the Ministry of the Interior. She looks particularly at intimate partner violence. (11/14/2022) more

Damage to the elevator, signs and a pane: A group of young people is said to have raged in a high-rise building. (11/10/2022) more