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The accused policewomen in court: "I just thought 'Please don't get in the back of my head'"
Photo: Bernd Thissen / dpa
Because, according to the conviction of the court, they abandoned their colleagues in a life-threatening shootout, two policewomen have been sentenced to one year suspended prison sentence.
Should this ruling by the Schwelm bei Hagen district court become final, the two women would lose their civil servant status and would no longer be able to work in the police force.
The court followed the demands of the public prosecutor's office, which accused the two of attempting dangerous bodily harm in office by failure to do so.
The 32 and 37-year-old officers happened to come to an escalated traffic control one night in early May 2020 in Gevelsberg, North Rhine-Westphalia.
A driver opened fire on two of the policewomen's colleagues.
When one of the two went down hit, the policewomen ran away.
Instead of intervening, they stopped a car and instructed the driver to drive away.
»True to the motto: better them than me«
You understand the fear of death described by both women, said the judge in her verdict.
Nevertheless, as police officers, they were legally required to act differently - i.e. not to flee, but to fire a warning shot from cover, for example.
With their escape, they would have left their colleagues to their fate in a life-threatening situation, "true to the motto: better them than me," said public prosecutor Jörn Kleimann earlier in his plea.
The two policewomen asked for understanding for their escape.
“I was expecting at any moment to be hit myself.
I just thought, 'Please don't get in the back of my head,' ”the 32-year-old said through tears.
"Everything in me switched to survival"
"I never hid myself even in dangerous missions," said the senior colleague.
But this situation was different.
In the dark they would have seen little and only heard the gunshots.
“I didn't know who, why, or how many.
Everything in me switched to survival. ”From the car they had called the control center and after a while they had been instructed to return to the scene.
No training had prepared them for such a situation, said the women.
"You don't practice getting out of the patrol car and getting caught in a hail of bullets," said the 37-year-old.
“Yes, we have various training courses with the police.
But never some where we know you will die soon, «said the younger convict.
The colleagues on the witness stand also took the defendants' protection up: he did not blame them at all, "says the policeman who was shot in action.
He is convinced that the situation would have gone like this regardless of what his colleagues did or not do.
Attorney Eckhardt Wölke, who represents the older of the two policewomen, announced her appeal: "You can't leave the verdict like that," he said.
The situation was life-threatening.
He thinks it is questionable that a shot from a distance could have changed something.
In particular against the background of the threatened loss of the civil service rights of his client, he will appeal.
ptz / dpa