Crime scene: bitter almonds

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Episode of the series Tatort
Original title Bitter almonds
Country of production Germany
original language German
Production
company		 WDR ,
Colonia Media
length 88 minutes
classification Episode 437 ( List )
First broadcast March 5, 2000 on Das Erste
Rod
Director Kaspar Heidelbach
script Karl-Heinz Beetle
production Sonja Goslicki ,
Jan Hinter
music Arno Steffen
camera Dragan Rogulj
cut Hedy Altschiller
occupation

Bitter Almonds is a television film from the Tatort crime series. The film is the 11th case of the Cologne team of investigators Max Ballauf and Freddy Schenk . The report produced by Westdeutscher Rundfunk and Colonia Media was broadcast for the first time on March 5, 2000 on ARD 's first program.

action

The young, attractive Marion Grimm finds her older lover, Gerd Weisbach, dead in his villa on the ground. The coroner suspects potassium cyanide (hydrocyanic acid) because it smells of bitter almonds, which the autopsy confirms. Although it is suspected suicide, it could also have been an act of relationship. An incurable cancer is also found during the autopsy.

Ballauf receives his wife Evelyn Weisbach at the airport when she comes back from Tenerife. She doesn't seem overly shaken because she lived separately from her husband and everyone went their own way. She informs him that her husband suffered from depression and announced that he would commit suicide at some point. There was also a marriage contract: in the event of a divorce, it would have ended up empty. Evelyn is sure that he didn't want to get a divorce. She knew that her husband had a girlfriend, and that he had even set up a gym for her. When Schenk arrives there to talk to Marion Grimm, he sees how she is being comforted by a fitness trainer. The jealous Weisbach knew nothing of this relationship. He really wanted to divorce his wife in order to marry Marion.

Research shows that Weisbach was involved in pending criminal proceedings. He was responsible for a traffic accident, as a result of which the accident victim, Axel Nehls, was paralyzed from the cervical vertebra. Axel's wife Dagmar is bitter because Weisbach had neither apologized nor shown any remorse. The investigators find out that she was present at Weisbach's last party as an employee of a party service. So she comes under suspicion.

In Weisbach's villa you will find a tablet jar under his medication, the contents of which were probably replaced by a capsule. Forensic doctor Dr. Roth now has another dead person on the dissection table who allegedly just killed himself - with potassium cyanide. Since this is now the fifth cyanide death in recent weeks, the investigators pay attention and discover that the dead were all nursing cases and were cared for by one and the same carer: Martin Lotz. He is questioned and admits that he has passed on the names of his patients willing to die on request. He received a commission for this, but nothing more. Schenk can persuade him to contact the "death helper" and give the name and address of his grandmother as a customer. Shortly afterwards, a certain "Schlegel" reports and Schenk appears at an agreed meeting point with 3000 DM. Schlegel hands over the money in the St. Andreas church in Cologne . In return, Grandma Schenk should not receive a capsule with 1 g of potassium cyanide in the mail until the next few days. Before Schenk knows it, Schlegel has disappeared through the sacristy. Although Ballauf was careful in front of the church, Schlegel managed to escape them. They search all the companies in the area that deal with cyano compounds to find the poison dealer. After a long search you will find what you are looking for. Despite the tight control of the offices, it was possible for Schlegel to steal the smallest amounts of potassium cyanide. As the head of the company, he financially supported his company with this small sideline. He even kept a detailed book about it, but Gerd Weisbach is not to be found in the book, but Dagmar Nehls is. However, she asserts that she resold the capsule to Martin Lotz, her husband's carer and her lover.

At 3 a.m. Martin Lotz is found dead in his apartment. There is a large amount of money, a membership card from Marion Grimm's gym and a pack of vitamin capsules under which someone has smuggled a fake capsule containing potassium cyanide. Exactly these vitamin capsules are also sold through the gym. Ballauf finds a lead that leads to Lotz and Evelyn Weisbach. She had met Lotz in Tenerife when he was vacationing there. He actually sold her the Nehls capsule, which he knew, at a high price. When he found out that Weisbach had died of cyanide poisoning, he blackmailed Evelyn Weisbach, whereupon she also committed the second poisoning. Ballauf's suspicion was confirmed when the inspector surprised Ms. Weisbach while breaking into Lotz's premises.

Ms. Weisbach succeeds in stealing Ballauf's service weapon. In doing so, she forces him to take her out of town. By suddenly braking, Ballauf can temporarily incapacitate and arrest the murderer.

background

Ilse Werner can be seen in her last TV role as Grandma Schenk . The film was shot in Cologne, Bonn, Brühl and Solingen, among others.

reception

Audience ratings

When it was first broadcast on March 5, 2000, 7.88 million viewers followed this Tatort episode, which corresponded to a market share of 22.01%.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Production details on tatort-fundus.de, accessed on January 5, 2014.
  2. ↑ Filming locations at Internet Movie Database , accessed January 5, 2014.
  3. ↑ Audience ratings on tvspielfilm.de, accessed on January 5, 2014.
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Feb. 13, 2000: Flowers from Werder 		Crime scene follow next episode
12. Mar. 2000: Viktualienmarkt