Murder Case to Open in Germany

Normally, there are a handful of murder trials in Germany every year.  In most cases, these cases attract only local or state-wide interest....rarely attracting national interest.  This week, a case opens up which will attract a fair amount of national interest.  It won't be on ARD or ZDF (the public networks) but it likely will be in the print-media.

The case? Last year (2016)....on the evening of 16 October, a young Afghan gentleman by the name of Hussein K. is said to have raped a Freiburg nurse student (19-year-old Maria L.).  The situation for the nurse is that she was riding a bike home from a student-party, and Hussein 'jumped' her.  The accusation is that he then threw her in the river, where she drowned.  Cops came up two months later....finding enough evidence to connect Hussein, and charged him.

There are several interesting pieces to this court case, which the public might find curious.

First, as Hussein arrived in Germany....he noted his age on the application form....noting a juvenile age.  As long as he was 17 years old at the time of the crime.....he's a juvenile or minor and won't get that much jail-time.

Well...enough evidence has been presented that the court now has to decide if Hussein lied on the form and in the application....and that he was a minimum of 21 years old at the time of the murder....meaning a minimum of twenty years in prison.  If he can hold the court to juvenile status....it's roughly ten years of prison time.

There are expected to be near 45 witnesses for this court episode, and ten 'experts' (probably talking to the age issue).

The other curious thing is the previous crime.  Oh yeah....he was convicted n Greece back in 2014 because of a violent attack on a young Greek gal.  Ten years of prison.  Oddly, the Greek court system....without saying much of anything to the victim or her family.....released Hussein about a year into the sentence.  The term set by the Greek court was 10 years.  Barely a year into the sentence....they suddenly came up and released him....and off to Germany came Hussein.

To this day....no one from the Greek court system has been willing to stand and explain the release, or how the decision was made.  A bribe?  No one has ever suggested that.  Based on several news media reports from earlier in 2017....Hussein appeared in Germany within four weeks after release from Greece. It's an odd piece to the story but I doubt if any Greek official will come to Germany in this episode to explain their logic in the release. If there was a stipulation (typical in early releases) of probation.....then he ought to revert back to the ten-year sentence in Greece, but I imagine no one will dare bring up such an issue.

Length of this German episode?  Some differing views.  Some think it'll wrap up by Christmas.  Some think that the age issue might drag this into January or February of 2018.