After the monstrous case of child abuse in Münster, harsher punishments are being debated. The Minister of Justice is now also in favor of it. It should go quickly now. The CDU is also once again requesting data retention
Berlin (dpa) - Federal Justice Minister Christine Lambrecht now wants to get tougher punishments for child abuse quickly on the way.
"I have instructed my house to submit a corresponding regulation as soon as possible," said the SPD politician on Thursday evening in the ZDF "today journal". "That can and will happen quickly," said Lambrecht with conviction.
A weekend of serious sexual abuse of several children in Münster had become known. The 27-year-old prime suspect had two previous convictions for child pornography possession. So far, eleven suspects from several federal states have been arrested in the Münster case. Seven of them are in custody.
The Union had been under pressure in recent days and called for a change in criminal law to make child abuse a crime and to increase penalties related to child pornography. An act is deemed to be a crime that is punishable by at least one year imprisonment, and an offense is deemed to have been committed for which a smaller sentence or a smaller sentence can be imposed.
Lambrecht initially rejected the Union's demands and received a lot of criticism, but then turned around. The SPD politician now wants tougher minimum fines for abuse cases that are not associated with physical violence and abuse and for "commercial and gang-like" distribution of child pornography. The minimum prison terms in both areas are currently six months. Increasing them to one year would upgrade them from crimes to crimes.
With reference to the case of Münster, Lambrecht spoke of "disgusting crimes". These are already serious crimes that can be punished with up to 15 years in prison and subsequent preventive detention. She expects the judiciary to take advantage of the potential sentence.
CDU chief Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer told "Focus" that it was clear that child abuse would not be prevented with a stricter punitive framework. It's about the signal that society sends. "I want the integrity of children to be valued more than property, for example. Child abuse is certainly no less serious than theft and must also be judged accordingly."
The CDU chief also repeated her request for data retention. "We need data retention to fight child abuse." The topic is urgently back on the agenda. The data protection of the perpetrators should not be more important than the protection of the children.
When storing data, providers are legally obliged to store the telephone and Internet connection data of the users so that investigators can access them later. The issue has been the subject of controversy for years, especially with regard to data protection. The European Court of Justice ruled in 2016 that general and indiscriminate storage of telephone and internet connection data is not compatible with EU law.