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The main defendant before the youth chamber in Augsburg: Jägermeister and vodka before the crime
Photo: Karl-Josef Hildenbrand / dpa
Christian M., 50 years old, is a brave witness.
His cheekbone fracture was fixed with two plates, the eyelid is still hanging down, the left side of his face is numb.
And the psychological consequences of the beating attack?
The nights are sometimes a bit short, says the tiler in room 201 of the Augsburg regional court.
"Where it pulls me together is when I see a fire engine, it somehow comes up again."
Almost a year ago, in an ambulance, M. learned that his companion was no longer alive.
He had spent a cheerful evening in town with Roland S., his wife and his own wife.
Three or four mulled wines at the Christkindlesmarkt, then another beer in a pub.
Shortly after 10 p.m. the quartet was on their way to the taxi stand on Königsplatz in downtown Augsburg.
The women ran about ten meters in front of the men.
The witness and victim of violence M. today only has vague memories of what happened next.
Young people ran next to them and there was an exchange of words.
"Why Roland moved there, I have no idea," says M. in court.
Then everything went very quickly: "One or two sentences, then Roland was on the ground."
He himself pushed another youth away, and then he was beaten and kicked too.
Not on duty
On this Tuesday, the legal processing of the case, which had caused a stir nationwide, began in front of the youth chamber of the Augsburg regional court.
Mainly because the killed Roland S. was a firefighter.
More than 100 firefighters commemorated the deed of the deceased colleague in downtown Augsburg.
But S. got into the fatal argument as a private person.
His profession played no role in the act.
And yet another lopsided impression has now been corrected: The criminal prosecutors were initially accused of manslaughter committed jointly by seven teenagers or young men.
It is now about dangerous bodily harm resulting in death in one defendant and dangerous bodily harm resulting from two defendants.
What led to the escalation?
The 17-year-old alleged main perpetrator Halid S. and two of his cronies now have to answer before the youth chamber, they are 19 and 20 years old.
The two of them wear a white and a black baseball cap in the courtroom, underneath the hair on the sides is shaved.
The main defendant is the slimmest of the three.
Halid S. largely admits the allegation, his lawyer reads out a statement on the first day of the trial.
The other two defendants speak for themselves. Four other former defendants also appear as witnesses, whose proceedings have already been dismissed.
According to the version of the young men, they themselves only reacted to aggression: fireman Roland S. had provoked the argument.
So it was about a cigarette.
"Do you have a cigarette?" Asked a youngster.
He declared in court: "I have respect for older people."
But the passerby reacted threateningly: "He stood right in front of me."
Another young witness, when asked by the presiding judge Lenart Hoesch, said he had heard: "Do you have a cigarette?"
The answer from S. according to the young people: "Shut up."
The witness Christian M. did not hear this sentence.
When the fire man stood in front of him, he smelled the alcohol, says a witness.
The young men said they had drunk Jägermeister and vodka.
A fatal blow
What happened after that was recorded by several video cameras, the recordings are incorporated into the process: S. pushed the cigarette scorcher.
The alleged main culprit then attacked him.
According to the prosecution, this attack was "completely unexpected" and "without justification".
It was therefore a "powerful blow with the fist against the left half of the face at the level of the chin".
Unusually tragic: this one blow was fatal.
The rotation of the head in Roland S.'s cerebral artery tore and a lethal amount of blood collected in the brain.
Even a rushed emergency doctor could no longer save the 49-year-old's life.
Violence of the main perpetrator
In the indictment, the public prosecutor emphasizes the alleged main culprit's propensity for violence.
Accordingly, Halid S. was previously warned by a judge for assault and theft.
One of the co-defendants also has a criminal record.
Investigators found several videos glorifying violence on the young men's cell phones.
All three defendants were born in Augsburg, Halid S. has both German and Lebanese and Turkish citizenship.
In addition to Halid S., six other suspects were in custody for several months.
These men were eventually released after a legal tug-of-war between the Augsburg Regional Court and the Munich Higher Regional Court.
Even the Federal Constitutional Court dealt with the case.
It is now becoming apparent that a targeted approach as a group is out of the question.
Some of the accused stood meters away from the action.
"The chamber will have to examine what exactly was the reason for the dispute and who acted and how," explains the spokesman for the regional court, Christian Grimmeisen.
The crime is exceptionally well documented; there are several video recordings.
The list of 45 witnesses also includes passers-by and taxi drivers who observed the incident.
"The alcohol played a role, those involved were intoxicated," explains the defendant's attorney, Marco Müller, during a pause in the process.
Immediately after the fact, however, the investigators "alleged things that never emerged in the course of the proceedings".
Lawyer Isabel Kratzer-Ceylan emphasizes how badly her client is still doing.
She represents the firefighter's wife, who appears as a joint plaintiff.
She had to watch her husband suddenly lay dead on the floor.
"It is unimaginable to experience something like that," says the lawyer.
The widow is looking for stability, but the pain remains unbearable.
"My client wants justice for herself and her late husband."
For the time being, eight days of the trial are scheduled, the verdict could be in November.
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