German family opens front door, finds brick wall

One man in Germany found himself inside of a living nightmare earlier this week, when he went to open the front door of his house and found a brick wall. The family in Zellhausen, east of Frankfurt, had been the victim of a sinister prank.

In the night, police believe, several perpetrators worked to layer the bricks and mortar as quickly and as quietly as possible. Indeed, no one in the house, nor any of the neighbors, heard or saw a thing. This was not unusual, however, authorities said, as a group could so this "in a jiffy with a few practiced hands."

Speaking with local news outlet Hessenschau.de, police spokesman Ingbert Zacharias made it clear that is was no harmless joke. "We don't know if it was a trickster," or a personal attack on the family, Zacharias said.

Also, on top of being dangerous for the family, Zacharias said, the act had unpleasant associations to the construction of the Berlin Wall, which went up almost overnight in 1961 without alerting any of the city's residents.

"This is a crime and not a joke," the policeman said, adding that such crimes are usually solved within a matter of days and he believed the perpetrators would be apprehended soon.