Husband, 46, ‘drugged wife, 32, then stuffed dead body into case he dumped in river to get custody of daughter’

A nasty husband is said to have drugged his wife before stuffing her body in a suitcase in a twisted attempt to get custody of their daughter.

The dismembered body of 32-year-old Ekaterina was found in a box floating on the river in the city of Bremerhaven.

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The woman’s husband, Walter B., 46, is charged with murder in the Bremen Regional Court.

He has not commented on the allegations against him.

Ekaterina’s body washed up on the riverbank in March, reports Bild.

Suspicion fell on her husband of 10 years, Walter B., who claimed his wife ran away.

And now, months after the woman’s death, the 46-year-old has been charged with murder.

Prosecutors believe the suspect spiked his wife’s drink with diazepam before strangling her while she slept.

He is said to have dismembered her body and wrapped the severed body parts in foil and garbage bags.

The accused then stuffed them into a suitcase, which he later threw into the water, according to the indictment.

According to information from the outlet, the suspect is said to have abused his wife, who had stayed in a women’s shelter twice before her murder.

The situation appears to have worsened when Ekaterina, from Saint Petersburg, Russia, filed for divorce and planned to return to her home country with the couple’s six-year-old daughter, Viktoria.

The woman’s mother, Svetlana, 53, told the outlet the suspect even took the woman’s bank cards and banned her from meeting anyone.

Prosecutors believe the man’s motive was to prevent his wife from gaining “sole custody.”

Walter B proposed to Ekaterina a week after they met while on vacation in Turkey in 2009.

The following year they married in Bremerhaven, and their daughter was born in 2017.

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