If you believe Jan M., he must have been waiting for this day. Finally, refute all the allegations that the prosecution raises against him: he had debts, cheated, deceived, falsified and insidiously killed a man out of greed and to enable a criminal offense.
Jan M. sits in room I of the district court Frankfurt am Main, white shirt, cufflinks, suede shoes. The 51-year-old is charged with murdering his business partner Irina A., because of robbery with fatalities and fraud.
Prosecutor Miriam Haßbecker accuses the restaurateur, on the evening of 8 May 2018, the 29-year-olds in Niddapark to have repaid his debts - allegedly in the presence of a third cash-strapping person. "In fact, there was no lender, and Mr. M. was not planning to settle his debts," says the prosecutor. Rather, he initiated the meeting to get rid of Irina A. and her more and more urgent demands for repayment, which he could not fulfill.
Jan M. is said to have attacked the woman on a park path with a knife, stabbing her on the chest, head and neck at least 21 times, pulling her onto an adjacent meadow and leaving it there. Previously, he stole the killed another Rolex wristwatch, a diamond ring and the car key. The body of the woman was discovered the next day, her face was no longer recognizable.
Great in the Frankfurt party scene
Jan M. waits calmly until the presiding judge gives him the floor. He is well known in the Frankfurt nightlife, he owned several clubs or he was involved in them, such as at the "Katana Club" on Taunustor, in which years ago members of the Hells Angels delivered a shootout. Jan M. enjoys coquetting with his life, which he led before he became a big name in the Frankfurt party scene: when he studied business administration after completing his training as a bank clerk and worked as a graduate businessman at a large accounting firm and later as an investment banker at a private bank. He is the father of two sons.
For years, Jan M. led the "First in" in the Fressgass', which was getting worse, which is why he let himself be carried away to a strange PR action: He spread the legend that several dozen immigrant men had harassed his guests on New Year's Eve 2016 and threatened. His chief witness: Irina A., who now owned half of the bar and described in detail in newspaper and television interviews, how the "sex mob" raged.
But everything was invented, the lie flew open, the prosecutor brought charges for spoofing a crime. In June 2018, both should therefore answer before the district court. The prosecution does not rule out that this could be a motive why Jan M. killed the young woman.
When the defendant is allowed to speak out, he lets his lawyer Hans Wolfgang Euler speak, an experienced defense lawyer, who has already represented the RAF terrorist Verena Becker and Ernst August Prince of Hanover. "The process before us because of the so-called Frankfurt sex mob affair has never let me think about eliminating Irina as a confidant." Both were determined to admit their mistakes.
Wash 500-euro bills in a big way
"I did not kill Irina or kill her," says Euler on behalf of his client. Jan M. met the Moldavian wife, mother of four-year-old twins, seven, eight years ago. She was not only a well-known party girl in the Frankfurt nightlife, but always tried to come to the "big money". Maybe that cost Irina her life?
DPA
In memory of Irina A. in the Niddapark (archive)
One day before her death, Irina A. asked him to accompany her in the evening to a meeting with a potential business partner. She had previously revealed no details, only want to hear his opinion in the aftermath. He was skeptical, Jan M. has his lawyer Euler recite. He recalled how Irina A. in the autumn of 2017 brought in an "investor" who wanted to "wash" 500-euro bills "on a grand scale". That was under no circumstances eligible for him.
Nevertheless, Jan M. accompanied Irina A. to Niddapark on May 7, 2018. She had "extremely nicely dressed up", they had also asked him several times for money for "fireworks" - a code for cocaine, which she had consumed almost daily.
Together they drove to the restaurant on the Niddapark, walked into the park and sat down on a bench there. No one had come, so they drove back to West End. If he would accompany her tomorrow, Irina A. asked. But Jan M. had no desire and no time had.
On May 8, 2018, at 7:00 pm, Irina A. telephoned him to ask if he would be present at a second attempt. Jan M. refused, he says. "She obviously did not like it, but she agreed and was not out of humor."
The prosecutor said that Jan M. had made an appointment with Irina A. to give her 20,000 euros, argues the 51-year-old from. He had been at a football game of his son that evening, then at home and before midnight with his partner in a restaurant. At one o'clock he went to sleep, woke up at about three o'clock and wondered why Irina A. had not reported as they had agreed. "Because she was actually pretty reliable, at least."
"I was completely confused"
He decided to change his motorcycle in the middle of the night because it blocked the driveway. "What has ensued will not be clear to anyone and is only comprehensible to people who knew about my behavior towards Irina." I asked her out of all sorts of predicaments, whether asked or not, even though it was not always easy, "says Euler for Jan M. before.
Sitting on the bike, Jan M. decided to look for Irina A., so he drove past her home, at her local pub and finally to the Niddapark. He was "actually worried". Her car had stood in the parking lot of the Niddapark restaurant, but the bar had been locked. Jan M. wants to run into the dark park, he called for Irina A.
On the right side of the path in the grass, something was lying, "as if an animal had curled up and laid down," Euler reads in Jan M's assignment. "I recognized Irina by her braids lying on her stomach." He spoke to her, touched her, felt her pulse. When he realized that Irina A. was dead, he was on his way back. "I was completely confused." "Unterschwellig" he had made on the way to his motorcycle the decision to conceal his discovery. "I was just afraid that I could be linked to the death of Irina."
And what about the traces of blood found by Jan M. near the crime scene? They came from an old, already verschorften injury, which must be burst again, says Jan M.
The evidence begins with a detective who interrogated Jan M. several times. He summarizes the statements made by Jan M. in his first two police interrogations, which can not be reconciled with his admission in court. He had "quite a lot of nonsense" of himself and also lied, admits Jan M. now. In the preliminary proceedings, he then said nothing, he had found it difficult. "It was based on advice."