Stuttgart, Sept 17, (dpa/GNA) – A 26-year-old Afghan man was sentenced to life imprisonment on Tuesday, after a German court found him guilty of fatally stabbing a police officer in the south-western city of Mannheim last year.
In addition to the one count of murder, the defendant, only identified as Sulaiman A under German privacy laws, was also found guilty of four counts of attempted murder as well as of grievous bodily harm.
The Stuttgart Higher Regional Court recognized the particular severity of the crimes, meaning the defendant will not be eligible for early release after serving 15 years.
Six people were injured in the stabbing on Mannheim’s market square on May 31, 2024, including five participants in a rally organized by the anti-Islam Citizens’ Movement Pax Europa (BPE).
A 29-year-old police officer was also injured and died of his injuries two days later.
The attacker was shot by police at the scene.
The court sided with prosecutors who said the defendant, identified with the Islamic State terrorist militia, and had been radicalized over a number of years prior to the attack.
They said he aimed to not only kill prominent BPE member Michael Stürzenberger, a vocal Islam critic, but also to take down as many opponents to Islam and “supposed infidels” as possible.
The attacker wanted to cause “as much damage as possible in the shortest possible time,” said the presiding judge.
According to the judge, the defendant’s limited capacity to bear criminal responsibility was not established in the proceedings. A total of 61 witnesses and 15 experts were heard over 31 days of hearings.
The defendant confessed to carrying out the stabbing during the trial and showed signs of remorse, apologizing to the victims and their relatives ahead of the verdict.
When asked about his motive, he cited Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, saying the events that began in 2023 changed his life.
He is said to have exchanged messages on Telegram with someone, who encouraged him in his plan to kill Stürzenberger.
A is said to have fled his native Afghanistan at the age of 11. He arrived in Frankfurt in 2013, where he applied for asylum, dpa understands.
While his request was rejected, authorities imposed a ban on deporting him, presumably because of his age.
He did not have any previous convictions, and was not known to police prior to the attack, living with his wife and two young children in a town some 35 kilometres north-east of Mannheim.
The parents of slain police officer Rouven Laur and one of his sisters were present, when the verdict was handed down. The father left the courtroom after two hours, while the mother was tearing up at the end of the proceedings.
The family declined to comment directly on the outcome, but their lawyer said they were happy with the ruling.
In the wake of the attack, the couple closed its optician business in the town of Neckarbischofsheim. During the closing arguments of the joint plaintiffs, it was stated that the family was under too much strain to continue running the shop.
The attack in Mannheim was one of several stabbings and car-rammings on passers-by or crowds in several German cities over the past year. The fact that some of them were carried out by migrants has fuelled a major debate about migration policy.
In the wake of the Mannheim stabbing, the government announced plans to facilitate the deportation of Afghan nationals convicted of particularly serious offences, after Germany had halted deportations in the wake of the Taliban takeover.
Last week, a Syrian national was sentenced to life imprisonment after a German court, found him guilty of carrying out a deadly Islamic State attack on a festival in the western city of Solingen last year.
GNA