Family father shoots and burns loved ones – imprisonment
15 months after the death of a young woman, the trial against a 35-year-old ended before the Cologne district court – with a prison sentence. The accused is said to have killed his lover.
The defendant, whose grey-black hair falls in an elegant wave onto his white shirt collar, used the last minutes before the verdict was announced to carefully straighten his cuffs. As the chamber entered the hall, he threw back his head in victory.
His defense attorney had pleaded for an acquittal. However, the judges did not follow this request: “The accused is sentenced to eleven years in prison for manslaughter and intentionally carrying a weapon,” appointed the chairwoman, Ulrike Grave-Herkenrath.
Cologne: 35-year-old convicted of manslaughter
The family man from Cologne, who was previously in custody and now has the prospect of not being released for years to come, seems more annoyed than shocked. He and his lawyer followed the two-and-a-half-hour explanation of the judge’s verdict with head shakes, eye rolls, contemptuous snorting and lots of whispering.
The behavior of the two adult men follows that of successful schoolchildren, although the reason for the proceedings is shocking: the lover of the 35-year-old from Cologne, who shows no signs of being affected, was shot, placed on a dirt road in Ochtendung in Rhineland-Palatinate and burned. The judges of the 4th major criminal chamber at the Cologne district court are convinced that he killed the woman.
Chamber considers statements by defendant to be protective statements
The accused initially remained silent, but then made a statement on the 17th day of the trial, after numerous pieces of evidence spoke against him. Accordingly, an acquaintance of his started the crime, he was only there.
“The chamber asked itself whether you told us the true perpetrator and whether you were innocently in custody for eleven months,” says Grave-Herkenrath: “We are certain that this is an untrue protective claim that you are a perpetrator wanted to cover up.”
Only after the crime did an acquaintance of the accused come to him when he called. Both are said to have brought the woman’s body in her own car from Cologne to Rhineland-Palatinate and set it on fire there.
Cell phone data provides valuable evidence
Extensive evaluations of mobile phone data well into the period before the crime would have revealed links between the man’s acquaintance and the woman who was killed. The allegations by the accused that his loved ones had taken drugs and that they might have been involved in drug dealings also had no substance in the court’s eyes.
Forensic examinations had proven that the young mother had not consumed any drugs. “There was still enough material for that,” said the judge, looking at the body disfigured by the fire. Her parents and her husband, from whom she had separated for the relationship with the defendant, were joint plaintiffs in the proceedings.
“They were not only concerned with the circumstances of the death, but also with the laying down of the corpse,” Grave-Herkenrath acknowledged the family’s difficult situation.
Numerous traces point to perpetrators
Numerous indications speak for the perpetration of the 35-year-old married man, for the family difficulties resulting from the affair and his wife’s application for divorce, as Grave-Herkenrath listed: The murder weapon was found in his basement. His DNA was found at all points of contact with the weapon.
Traces of smoke were found on his thumb when he was arrested, seven days after the crime. There were also traces of gunshot residue on his jacket and on a pair of trousers, which he left behind in a boarding house after the woman’s death, along with her personal belongings.
Cologne judge: “We are convinced that you are the perpetrator”
It is clear that the young woman from Rhineland-Palatinate, who was traveling with her lover in Cologne in the days before her violent death, was shot in her car, a Fiat Panda. When the accused was arrested, both keys of this car were found on him.
Before that, he had the car thoroughly cleaned: “The passenger seat was removed and properly watered, but that did not mean that all traces of blood had disappeared,” summarized the chairman, who also pointed out that the accused had killed his loved one’s car offered for sale to the man who did the cleaning.
“We couldn’t clarify all the questions, including not dying based on the motive. But the ‘who’ has been clarified. We are convinced that you are the perpetrator,” the judge explained. The verdict is not yet legally binding.