AWhen Hendrik R. drove into a kissing couple at a zebra crossing in Kriftel between Frankfurt and Wiesbaden on the night of September 6, 2015 and dragged the woman, Silke T., several hundred meters, he killed her for base reasons. A jury at the Frankfurt Regional Court decided this on Monday and sentenced the defendant to a life sentence for murder and grievous bodily harm to the man; Given the excessive duration of the proceedings, half a year is considered to have been served.
After around a year of trial, the judges are convinced that Hendrik R. accepted the death of the forty-one-year-old in those fatal seconds. The “universal occasion” – his anger coupled with the defendant’s claim that he should not be prevented from continuing his journey – was in stark disproportionate proportion to the possible consequences of his act that he could recognize, the death of a person. The reasoning behind the verdict is that he therefore acted in a particularly morally reprehensible manner for base motives.
The first judgment was rejected by the BGH
In the first trial in 2018, another jury chamber of the regional court was unable to determine with sufficient certainty that there was an intent to kill and therefore sentenced R. to a prison sentence of five and a half years for bodily harm resulting in death.
The Federal Court of Justice later overturned the verdict. What was going on in the defendant's head, what he was aware of, what consequences he accepted – all of this had to be examined more closely in the opinion of the Karlsruhe judges.
The actual facts became clear relatively early on: After the court festival ended in late summer 2015, R. wanted to go home as quickly as possible that evening. At a roundabout he met Silke T. and her partner. They stood entwined on the crossing and didn't move aside when R. let the heavy limousine roll up close to them. Then the then 25-year-old student drove off behind the wheel of the car he had borrowed from his father.
Silke T. ended up on the hood, managed to hold on for a few seconds, but then slipped down and was run over. A leg got stuck in the wheel arch and, as a forensic doctor assumed, T. must have desperately fought for her life in the following seconds. Although his fellow passengers vehemently asked them to stop, R. only drove the two-ton car onto the sidewalk after around 400 meters. T. apparently suffered fatal injuries to his chest.
The defendant, whose defense attorneys had requested a suspended sentence for negligent bodily harm resulting in death, will probably appeal again. It was not clear how he received the verdict on Monday.
He followed the judge's verdict wearing a cap and a corona protective mask. Relatives and friends of those killed, who had protested loudly at the end of the first trial, cried, hugged each other and spoke of a “fair verdict.”
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