Trial of Franco A. in Frankfurt: How the officer posed as a Syrian refugee

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Defendant Franco A. in court: "I cannot remember that I was in need of an explanation."

Photo: KAI PFAFFENBACH / REUTERS

The good feeling with which Franco A. left the higher regional court in Frankfurt am Main after the first day of the trial should have evaporated by the end of this second day of the trial. At the beginning of the day, the Bundeswehr officer in his pink shirt is sitting in front of a laptop in the dock and has obviously prepared himself. He wants to explain in free speech and with the help of a manuscript why he posed as an asylum seeker from Syria and maintained a double life for more than a year: as a soldier and asylum seeker.

The federal prosecutor accuses Franco A. of "preparing a serious act of violence that endangers the state," as the terrorist paragraph reads. The 32-year-old is said to have planned attacks on politicians, among others. With the help of the invented identity of a Syrian in Germany, he wanted to direct the suspicion to a recognized asylum seeker in order to shake the confidence of the population in Merkel's migration policy. In addition, Franco A. is said to have hoarded ammunition and explosive devices from the armed forces, owned unauthorized rifles and hid a pistol in a toilet at Vienna Airport.

His admission begins pathetically.

"I disregarded the law," says Franco A., "I am truly sorry".

"I was right when I applied for asylum (...) I was wrong when I played a role in front of fellow men that was not true." With them he owes the debt.

It was never his intention to harm them.

Staging as a servant of the state with an altruistic personality

With the onset of the refugee crisis, a point had been reached for him, according to A., at which, in his understanding, "the interests of the Federal Republic of Germany were so obviously violated" that he did not want to accept it.

As a soldier, he swore an oath and learned civil courage and responsibility for the community in the Bundeswehr, as well as helping people in need.

The Chancellor, however, "did not respect" the Basic Law. His belief in the political actors was "shaken". In order to form his own opinion, he dressed after Christmas 2015 like someone who had come to Germany hundreds of kilometers on foot and pretended to be a refugee. In his lecture in court, Franco A. presents himself as a servant of the state with an altruistic personality who only wanted to expose political grievances.

After 22 minutes, the chairman of the 5th criminal senate, Christoph Koller, interrupted defendant A. with friendly words.

As with all state security proceedings, "especially this one", there are two levels: that of the facts and that of the motives.

Since Franco A. interwoven the two in his lecture, Koller politely asks him to concentrate on the facts first.

Franco A. then describes how he appeared two or three days before New Year's Eve 2015 in front of a warehouse in his hometown of Offenbach that had been converted into asylum seekers' accommodation and pretended to be David Benjamin.

"Asylum, please," he asked the security man, who referred him to a police car nearby.

Franco A. claims to have heard one of the police officers remark: "Another one." The officers took him to the 2nd police station in Offenbach.

Franco A. claims to have realized there: "Now the matter is in focus."

On the first floor of the guard he had to wait in front of a map of the world.

His gaze fell on Syria, so he spontaneously decided to declare Damascus his bogus hometown.

An officer finally explained to him at an S-Bahn station how to buy a ticket and take it to the central reception point in Giessen.

First, however, he went back to his Offenbach apartment, reports A. There he researched the Internet and finally built a "credible legend" that was bought from him at the official hearing on December 30, 2015 in Giessen.

There were no critical inquiries there.

"I don't remember getting into an explanation."

"To keep effort as low as possible"

Judge Koller presented the vita of the invented David Benjamin because A. was "very reluctant" to do it himself: According to this, David Benjamin grew up in Aleppo in Syria as a Christian of French descent; attended grammar school without qualification, worked as a farmer on his parents' farm until IS attacked the family, killed the father and destroyed the property with grenades. His mother has also died, he has no contact with his brother, and he could not find a cousin in Damascus. He feels persecuted by IS because of his beliefs. He came to Freilassing via Turkey, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria and Austria - without his passport, which he lost on the way. David Benjamin has only a rudimentary command of Arabic because only French was spoken in his microcosm.

In fact, A. says in court that his French is so good that he is often asked which region in France he comes from.

After the hearing in Giessen he ended up in an asylum seeker accommodation in Erding, Bavaria, says A. and admits: From then on, he lived two lives until he was exposed.

The life of an officer who lived in Offenbach and served in the barracks in Illkirch, Alsace, the location of the Franco-German Jägerbrigade 291.

And at the same time the life of the civil war refugee in the accommodation in Erdig.

Judge Koller wants to know how he managed that.

He tried "to keep the effort as low as possible," replies A. "I had a backpack, in it was my entire refugee life." He always had this backpack with him so that he could slip into his invented alter ego at any time.

This also included a mobile phone that he had bought especially and that he used to keep in touch with roommates.

These have become his "brothers and sisters".

In Giessen, however, he noticed that it was an exaggeration to show up there “in rags”.

The real refugees would have looked "much better".

"Established racist sentiments"

How long he wanted to live this double identity, asks Koller. One option, according to A., was to get your own apartment in Munich and work as an interpreter until he disappeared from the files. "But it didn't get that far."

Franco A. says nothing about notes, voice messages and minutes from questionable chat groups that reveal his right-wing extremist ideas. But the chief investigator of the Federal Criminal Police Office can say something about it and reports on racist statements that can be attributed to A., from Hitler's "Mein Kampf" and from A's master's thesis, which the constitution protection classifies as an attempt to prove the existence of a "Jewish world conspiracy". According to the indictment, Franco A. has for years been driven by a "solid ethnic, nationalist and racist sentiment" and a "particular aversion to people of the Jewish faith".

Apart from the few questions from the Senate, A. does not want to answer any more, from the representatives of the Federal Public Prosecutor and his curriculum vitae.

He is also silent on the allegations relating to the illegal and allegedly stolen weapons and ammunition.

"In this regard, we have to begin the large-scale taking of evidence," judge Koller stated on the day of the trial.

Also because A's confession was "less comprehensive" than expected.

"It will be a very long main hearing, you can say that now."