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Rhineland-Palatinate: Prosecutors demand life imprisonment for Trier amok drivers

2022-07-15T12:03:13.914Z


The suspected Trier amok driver has been charged with five counts of murder and 18 counts of attempted murder. The public prosecutor speaks of a "hunt for innocent people" - and pleads for the maximum penalty.


Enlarge image

Defendant Bernd W. (right) in the Trier district court

Photo: Harald Tittel / dpa

Bernd W., who killed five people and seriously injured 14 others with his Land Rover on December 1, 2020 in a pedestrian zone in Trier, is to be imprisoned for life, according to the public prosecutor's office.

The 52-year-old was "hunting on innocent people" in his gray Land Rover, said public prosecutor Eric Samel in his closing arguments before the Trier district court.

Five people were killed in the act on December 1, 2020, including a nine-week-old baby.

The allegations in the indictment were "absolutely confirmed" in the course of the trial, Samel said.

The accused Bernd W. is accused of five counts of murder, attempted murder in 18 cases and dangerous and serious bodily harm in 14 cases.

The public prosecutor's office also applied for the determination of the particular gravity of the guilt and demanded that the accused be housed in a psychiatric facility.

The exact motive for the act remained unclear – the accused did not comment on the allegations during the course of the trial.

According to the public prosecutor's office, the act was at least indirectly related to the alleged perpetrator's mental illness.

An expert had certified W. in a report as delusional and paranoid schizophrenia.

The defendant is therefore only partially culpable.

The accused sees himself as a "guinea pig"

According to the expert, the defendant was convinced that he had been a "guinea pig" in a government experiment in 1973 - at the age of about three to four years, Samel explained.

At that time he was injected with a “radioactive substance”.

According to the expert, the accused relativized or ignored inquiries as to whether this could really be the case.

W. is convinced that money will be withheld from him to this day.

He was therefore in a "spiral of aggression and anger," said prosecutor Samel.

According to the expert, there is also a risk that the delusional disorder of the accused will continue to spread: he is convinced that personal acquaintances are also involved in a "plot" against him.

This conviction is unshakeable for him and has consolidated over the years.

So after a few days in prison, W. also incorporated judicial officers into his delusions.

According to the prosecutor, the act was not directly related to the defendant's illness

However, the public prosecutor argued in his closing argument that the act was only indirectly related to the accused's illness.

In the weeks before the act, he had already dealt "intensively" with his project.

He is said to have repeatedly threatened to commit an act of violence.

The murder characteristics of malice and the use of means dangerous to the public were also "out of the question," said Samel.

"Nobody had to or could in any way" expect the attack, he said.

The accused had "came from behind with the intention of killing" and the people "were unsuspecting and defenseless".

It was "a targeted hunt for passers-by".

During the crime, the accused was not in a medical emergency, and his cognitive abilities were not restricted.

Rather, the 52-year-old "kept heading towards people again and again" and passed a bottleneck in the pedestrian zone easily and at high speed.

More than twenty people were injured in the act, some seriously.

The course of the amok drive across the pedestrian zone of Trier can be completely traced thanks to a "staggering abundance of evidence and witness statements", emphasized Samel.

A verdict is expected in mid-August.

fek/AFP

Source: spiegel

All life articles on 2022-07-15

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