Manuela Prill from the Nuremberg magazine famos interviews private detective Patrick Kurtz, owner of Kurtz Detective Agency Nuremberg and Franconia, on the topic “Up and Away.”

“I’ve Never Been to New York . . .”

“Just going out to buy cigarettes and never coming back — that’s the classic. Simply leaving, spontaneously, without any obvious reason for partner and family? Private detective Patrick Kurtz has a lot of experience in tracking down missing persons. He knows: when someone decides to disappear, a wide variety of motives can lie behind it.

 

‘And on the stairs he felt, as if this were a departure/I would simply have to go away for all time ...’ Almost everyone knows Udo Jürgens’ song about the man who goes out for cigarettes and dreams, in the meantime, of running away. Because his life seems oppressive, dull and full of respectability, and he has never been to New York, where perhaps everything might be much nicer. ‘We’ve never actually had a case exactly like the song,’ says Patrick Kurtz. The 29-year-old runs 30 detective offices across Germany, including in Nuremberg. On average they are commissioned to search for a missing person nationwide about once a month. Usually by the partner or a family member of the missing person. The first and most important step for any search is always to investigate the motive. What could be the reason for someone to disappear? There are many different answers to that.”

Motives for deciding to disappear

“Quite often someone is found unconscious because of excessive alcohol consumption or illness, and for a time their identity cannot be established. ‘Then there are cases where people have problems and, for example, try to escape their creditors by disappearing,’ Kurtz says. Some go underground because they are themselves involved in criminal activities that their family know nothing about. Some, sadly, because they want to end their life. Or because they really want to hide from their family. ‘We have experienced that with, for example, Muslim girls whose families did not accept that they were with a German man,’ the private detective relates. People also say goodbye from relationships without prior warning and without explanation.

 

A separation by disappearing — this phenomenon is called “ghosting”, because someone virtually vanishes like a ghost into thin air. But can you really just up and leave in our digitalised world? ‘To disappear completely, without leaving visible traces, is very difficult,’ Kurtz believes. Unless you are prepared to forgo all comforts; you must not use credit cards in your real name, not rent accommodation, not take a plane. There are certainly still parts of the world without digital access, but you first have to get to those places.”

11,400 registered missing persons in Germany

“Whatever the reason someone disappears: for relatives the uncertainty, the fear that something terrible might have happened and the many unanswered questions are extremely hard to bear. Nobody is prepared for such a situation. The reactions Kurtz has seen among his clients range from powerlessness and despair to denial and to ‘never give up’. Some people search for their missing relatives for years.

 

According to the Federal Criminal Police Office (Bundeskriminalamt), at the beginning of the year 11,400 Germans were registered as missing. That figure includes cases resolved within a few days, but also people who have been missing for up to 30 years. The proportion of persons missing for more than a year is around three percent. Almost half of cases are clarified within a week.”

Note

The original article appeared in the print edition of the Nuremberg magazine famos. Emphases (bold) and links on this page may differ from the original.

Kurtz Detective Agency Nuremberg

Äußere Bayreuther Straße 59

D-90409 Nuremberg

Tel.: +49 911 3782 0154

Email: kontakt@kurtz-detektei-nuernberg.de

Web: https://www.kurtz-detektei-nuernberg.de/en

Google: https://g.page/kurtz-detektei-nuernberg