Icon: enlarge
Jan Philipp Reemtsma: Was kidnapped in 1996 from his property in Hamburg-Blankenese
Photo: Christian Charisius / dpa
In 1996 Thomas Drach and his accomplices kidnapped the Hamburg patron and sociologist Jan Philipp Reemtsma, around 25 years later the criminal is suspected of having committed several robberies.
Reemtsma has now referred to having demanded preventive detention for Drach in the case of his kidnapping as a joint plaintiff.
"It was clear that what he was doing was becoming more and more dangerous for other people," Reemtsma said in an interview with the dpa news agency.
"But there is no great satisfaction in being right about such a thing."
Reemtsma was kidnapped on March 25, 1996 on his property in Hamburg-Blankenese.
Drach and accomplices kept him chained in a cellar dungeon near Bremen for 33 days.
With the threat of killing him, they extorted a ransom of around 15 million euros.
After the money was handed over, they released him.
Drach was arrested in Buenos Aires two years later.
In 2001, the Hamburg district court sentenced him to 14 years and six months in prison for extortionate kidnapping, but did not order preventive detention.
After serving his sentence, Drach was released in 2013.
On February 23 of this year, the now 60-year-old was arrested again in Amsterdam.
He is charged with three robberies.
He is threatened with extradition to Germany.
He said at the trial 20 years ago that Drach had done nothing in his life other than to commit criminal acts, said Reemtsma.
Drach's idea during the kidnapping was to collect enough money once that he would either have a luxurious retirement age or the start-up capital for another, even bigger crime.
But that failed him.
“Obviously he no longer has that ransom, he has to commit more crimes.
And he's getting older and more impatient and dangerous, ”Reemtsma warned.
It happened exactly as he said it back then.
"Now there are two people seriously injured because he was not taken into preventive detention," said the sociologist.
In the current proceedings, Drach is accused of having shot and seriously injured a security guard with an assault rifle in March 2019 during an attack on a money transporter at Cologne / Bonn Airport.
In a similar attack in November 2019 in Frankfurt am Main, a security guard was shot and seriously injured.
Should Reemtsma be called as a witness in a new trial against Drach, he would do his duty to testify.
"I certainly wouldn't look forward to doing that again," said the 68-year-old.
Such a statement would be a psychologically stressful affair.
"But what has to be done has to be done."
Icon: The mirror
bbr / dpa
