A 23-year-old woman has been indicted for murder after allegedly tracking down a lookalike online and killing her in an effort to fake her own death.
The German-Iraqi woman, identified as Shahraban Kh-B, was first believed to a murder victim in August 2022 when a young woman's body was found in a parked Mercedes Ingolstadt, southern Germany.
Multiple family members even identified the body as her, however questions were raised after an autopsy report found unrecognised tattoos.
The murdered woman was subsequently named as Khadidja O, a 23-year-old Algerian-born beauty blogger from Heilbronn in the neighbouring state of Baden-Württemberg.
Following a year-long investigation, Veronika Grieser of the Ingolstadt state prosecutor's office told The Guardian the case was ready to be brought to court.
She said Shahraban Kh-B had contacted a number of women via their Instagram accounts who she thought looked similar to her, looking for someone to take part in an apparent music video shoot or cosmetic treatment.
Khadidja O agreed to a non-existent free treatment, being told her salon would be given publicity in return.
She was picked up in a black Mercedes by Shahraban Kh-B and her alleged accomplice Sheqir K, a 24-year-old Kosovan man, who then drove the blogger into a wooded area and convinced her to get out of the car.
Grieser said the accused pair "proceeded to carry out their plan … striking [Khadidja O] on the back of her head at least once, so that she fell to the ground, before killing her with 56 stabs of a knife,” completely disfiguring the body.
They then left the body on a street near Shahraban Kh-B's home, where her parents found who they initially thought was their daughter.
State prosecutors said Shahraban Kh-B had also offered a man €10,000 (NZ$18,130) to kill her husband's brother, however he took half of the money and did not act.
Both Shahraban Kh-B and Sheqir K are accused of murder and attempted incitement to murder, both denying the charges.
Shahraban Kh-B's motivation is believed to have been a desire to escape from a family row and begin a new life.
Given the strikingly similar appearances of the two women, the case has been dubbed the "doppelganger murder" by German media.
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