The district court of Munich I sentenced the Neurieder bank robber to five years in prison on Friday. This left the 29th criminal division under the prosecutor's demand for two years.
Neuried defender Werner Kränzlein had asked for three and a half years in prison. In his last word, the accused's tears came back: "I'm sorry I hurt so many people," he said, sobbing.
Before that, prosecutor Laurent Lafleur described the scenario surrounding the bank robbery in April 2019 in great detail. "It is a place you come to every day," the prosecutor began his plea, quoting one of the two bank employees who had been severely affected by the robbery. It was the second raid for the branch manager after 2014. And because the 40-year-old father was at large for weeks, she and her colleague and a customer lived in fear that the man would run around and do something to them. Curiously, this customer hadn't really noticed the robbery at all. Only afterwards did he panic slightly because he could not see for himself whether the man had already left the bank or was still in the rooms. The branch manager had managed not to let the perpetrator into the basement. She was terrified of this, especially the idea of being locked down there. Her colleague also suffered from sleep problems after the incident, was on sick leave and yet bravely returned to her job. Even today, she keeps seeing the image of the robbery. She misses "the light-heartedness of the past," she said as a witness in court. She accepted the accused's apology like her colleague.
Bought from the butcher after the fact
The man had acted due to massive financial problems. He had concealed his needs out of shame from his wife and four children. He only made a confession at the start of the process. Of the 10,000 euros of loot, he gave 700 euros to an employee, 4700 euros to his bank account, 3900 euros to his wife's account. This was used to pay rent arrears and other debts. Then he borrowed a rental car for 500 euros and bought groceries for his children - including a certain type of sausage from a butcher's shop in Munich that a son loved to eat. Finally, he drove home to Tittmoning (Traunstein district).
And so the process started.
