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Trial in Kiel: Dilettante crime plan?
Photo: Frank Molter / dpa
In the process of a faked death in the Baltic Sea, the public prosecutor has pleaded for several years in prison.
The 53-year-old Christoph H. and his wife of the same age were "acting jointly as accomplices of attempted insurance fraud," said public prosecutor Lethicia Miske at the Kiel regional court.
She demanded four years' imprisonment for the defendant and two years and ten months for his wife.
According to the indictment, the couple and the man's mother took out a total of 14 accident, term and life insurance policies in order to collect 4.1 million euros in the event of the accused's death.
As jointly planned, the 53-year-old staged his alleged death in the Baltic Sea from a motorboat accident in early October 2019.
The aim of the unemployed academic is said to have been to free him from his financially desolate situation and to enable the family to lead a luxurious life.
While his wife made contact with the police and insurance companies, H. hid for months, first in Hamburg and then in his mother's house in Schwarmstedt (Lower Saxony).
There he was caught behind boxes in the attic in early May 2020.
However, the plan went wrong.
It was "amateurish and constantly had to be improved," said prosecutor Miske.
The investigators suspected early and an expert found tampering with the sunken motorboat of the 53-year-old, which was found near Kiel.
The insurance companies did not pay immediately when the wife submitted the police report that her husband was believed to be dead.
"The defendants assumed that a simple death report would be enough to receive the money," said the prosecutor.
But the insurance companies demanded, among other things, the death certificate from a local court, which would delay a payment for at least six months.
Defense attorneys demand acquittal
For the defense lawyers Haylar Güler and Thomas Görtzen, however, the defendants got stuck in preparatory acts when they forged the plan and deceived investigators and insurance companies.
When the death was reported to the insurance company, they would not have expected the direct payment of the millions and would therefore not have made themselves liable to prosecution.
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bbr / dpa
