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Stephan Ernst sentenced to the maximum sentence: murder for a "particularly despicable" motivation
Photo: Thomas Kienzle / dpa
At the end of this historic process, the defense attorney reminded the presiding judge of a promise.
The lawyer Mustafa Kaplan sounded a little desperate when he said that the judge had offered his client a prospect at the beginning of the proceedings, namely if he made a "repentant confession".
But Stephan Ernst did not get this perspective.
The State Security Senate of the Higher Regional Court in Frankfurt am Main sentenced the 47-year-old to life imprisonment for the murder of the Kassel District President Walter Lübcke (CDU) and determined the particular gravity of the guilt.
Judges will decide later whether to order preventive detention.
Ernst was acquitted of the attempted murder of the refugee Ahmed I.
On the night of June 2, 2019, Ernst sneaked to Lübcke's house in Wolfhagen-Istha and shot him in the head from about a meter away.
The district president had sat on his terrace and smoked a cigarette.
The act was probably the first right-wing terrorist motivated murder of a politician in the Federal Republic.
Chief Public Prosecutor Dietmar Killmer said that Ernst wanted to set a "publicly noticed signal against the current state order."
The court found that Ernst shot Lübcke because he saw him as a "traitor to the people", that Ernst wanted to "punish" him for his liberal stance in refugee policy and that he wanted to prevent other politicians from taking similar positions.
Racist murder
Lübcke's murder was a turning point.
It was an attack on everyone who campaigns for refugees in a free state and stands up for their convictions.
The following attacks on a synagogue in Halle and on migrants in Hanau underscored the extent to which right-wing terrorism threatens society and this republic.
With the judgment, the court shows the severity that is appropriate to the gravity of this act.
Ernst killed out of racist convictions and thus out of a “particularly despicable” motivation that was “at the lowest level”, according to the Senate.
With their verdict, the judges also send a signal: The state is defensive.
In doing so, the Senate followed the psychiatric expert's report that, due to Ernst's deeply rooted hatred of foreigners, he could also be expected to commit serious crimes in the future.
At the age of 15, Ernst committed an arson attack on a house inhabited by Turkish families.
The process has shown that he never broke away from the right-wing scene, never abandoned his racist, nationalist attitude.
Did Markus H. instigate the murderer?
After several contradicting statements, Stephan Ernst actually showed remorse in the courtroom.
In tears he apologized to the widow Walter Lübcke and her sons.
He made a confession.
He answered questions from the court, the federal prosecutor's office and the Lübcke family.
"Nothing more is possible," said his defense attorney Kaplan, in the end he didn't even see a sign of murder and pleaded manslaughter.
But the court "largely" did not believe Ernst's account.
His statements did not match the results of the evidence.
Ernst had initially said that he had killed Lübcke alone.
Then he stated that his friend, co-defendant Markus H., had been with him at Lübcke's and had accidentally shot.
In the third version, Ernst said he shot himself, but Markus H. was there and instigated him.
One of the central questions of the process was therefore: How would the court rate the role of Markus H.?
In the end, it acquitted him of aiding and abetting murder.
Acquittals do not presuppose the conviction of the court of the innocence of a defendant, doubts about the involvement sufficed, so said the presiding judge Thomas Sagebiel.
Then the court would have to rule in favor of the accused.
Doubts remained
Markus H. was silent in court.
A strategy with which Andre E., who was accused in the trial against the right-wing terrorist »National Socialist Underground« (NSU), was successful.
The neo-Nazi E. was ultimately only convicted of procuring train cards for the NSU, not of accessory to murder.
It became clear that the strategy would also work for H. when he was released from custody in October.
Walter Lübcke's family were disappointed that H. was acquitted of the charge of complicity in murder.
The Federal Prosecutor's Office has announced that it will go into revision.
But it is the iron right of every accused to remain silent without the court being allowed to draw negative conclusions from it.
And doubts remained as to what role H. actually played.
In his plea, defense attorney Kaplan had said that the court should take into account the different statements of the accused.
"One person talks, lets himself in, shows remorse - the other is silent, grinning and provoking." In this process, however, something else was more important.
Ernst has the chance to show how lasting his remorse is.
Judge Sagebiel said he could change his political views in a prison dropout program.
Only then could preventive detention be avoided.
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