After the raid on neo-Nazis: The fear in Colditz remains

The men of the N. family, members of a network, have been in custody since a raid. MDR-Research shows how right-wing extremists were able to rule a small town in Saxony for decades – and authorities failed.

More than 200 hooded police officers arrived in Colditz in the spring for a major raid. In addition to 5.5 kilograms of crystal and seven weapons, the officers also discovered a large hemp plantation with 2,600 plants on the property of the N. family.

Your former timber trade was a center of the neo-Nazi scene until the 2010s. The three men of the family, aged 35, 38 and 67, have been in custody since the raid. But the network of right-wing extremists continues to terrify the small town in Saxony.

Hartmut Lehmann was one of the few who opposed the neo-Nazis. This was also the case in 2021, when angry citizens and right-wing extremists gathered in downtown Colditz during the Corona protests. At that time, Lehmann was on the market with a few supporters and held a counter-event.

attacks and intimidation

Like many others in Colditz, Lehmann has already experienced massive violence. After the raid he reports MDR Investigative from an earlier incident. In the summer of 2005, as the owner of a workshop at the time, he was called to a bus stop on the outskirts of Colditz when his motorcycle broke down. “There was a guy who still had a crash helmet on.” He asked why the man was still wearing his helmet in the heat of over 30 degrees.

“And then two other guys came around the corner and then hit me,” said Lehmann. They would have dragged him into the bus stop house and kicked him. The attackers said: “Think about who you mess with in Colditz and how you behave.”

The man with the mohican escapes with black eyes and bruises on his face. Coincidence or not: Ralf N. drove by just minutes after the robbery. It is one of numerous acts of violence in Colditz, where traces lead to the N. family. Much was never clarified: not even this attack on Lehmann.

Right-wing extremist scene since the 1990s

An active right-wing extremist scene had been developing in Colditz since the 1990s. Always in the middle: the N. family with father Ralf and the two sons Uwe and Andreas. Neo-Nazis repeatedly provoked at the market and demonstrated there, among other things, with T-shirts on which both killers and the motto “Angstzone Colditz” were depicted.

In addition, extreme right-wing martial artists organized themselves and posed in front of the N family’s business at the time. The city spoke of “the brown hall”.

Until twelve years ago, the Gasthof Zollwitz just outside the city gates was not only a village disco, but also a place for right-wing extremist concerts and training evenings. From there – on the outskirts of Colditz – on February 23, 2008, up to 100 hooded neo-Nazis set out for the city centre. Within an hour, the police received 14 emergency calls MDR Investigative present.

The goal of the march was an electronics store. In the hall next door, the owner’s sons had started putting on punk concerts. A caller explained that explosive devices were also being thrown into the building. A mega firecracker and a smoke grenade from NVA stocks end up in the electronics store.

The neo-Nazis moved on and smashed the windows of a kebab shop. Here, too, the police did not intervene, although officers with five emergency vehicles are only a few hundred meters away. It was a shock for Colditz at the time. “But I would like the information to be taken seriously,” said then-Mayor Manfred Heinz (FDP). “That one can react in time and so that the perpetrators can be arrested immediately.”

Soko Rex took over investigations

At that time, the “Soko Rex”, the special commission for right-wing extremism of the State Criminal Police Office, took over the investigation. But little comes of it, as the files show. The reason: Even after the attack, the police hadn’t found any of the neo-Nazis and they then covered for each other.

Only Ralf N. received a short suspended sentence. He had insulted and attacked police officers on the edge. In 2009, N. is said to have beaten up the then mayor Heinz at a city festival. Out of fear, he didn’t report it like he did MDR Investigative later confirmed.

After the attack, Soko Rex collected telephone connection data and interviewed many witnesses. When questioned by the police, witnesses repeatedly said that they were afraid of acts of revenge by the neo-Nazis and therefore did not want to comment fully.

The owner of the attacked electronics store has completely withdrawn since the attack. His two sons left the city. The father later sued the police. The administrative court in Leipzig agreed with him and ruled that the police “… measures to protect the business premises […] failed despite knowledge of a dangerous situation.”

court proceedings there is only rarely

against Father and his sons from the N. family received 424 reports over the years. It is mainly about threats, traffic offenses and bodily harm, but also about robbery and coercion. Only five of the allegations were classified as right-wing extremists. As the files show, the police and public prosecutor’s office had mostly not determined a motive. Even in the manageable number of cases in which there were criminal proceedings, the courts avoided this question.

In 2014, Ralf N. had to go to prison for a short time for numerous violations of probation conditions. In the same year, his son Uwe was picked up by the police with 1.8 kilograms of crystal meth and sentenced to more than four years in prison. The matter was pursued as an individual act, the responsible public prosecutor’s office in Leipzig did not recognize a network.

Explosive device and ball bomb on pension

One of the few who were willing to report on the machinations of the family in front of the camera at the time was Ralph Gorny, who still runs a boarding house in the city center to this day. Gorny had described that Uwe N. not only constantly drove through the city center in big cars, but also mobbed tourists: “For the last ten to fifteen years he has been bothering guests from my pension. He said you are foreigners and we need them not your money.”

Today he no longer wants to be interviewed because his statements at the time had serious consequences for him. After the interview had been broadcast, a functional explosive device was placed in front of his house – threatening phone calls followed. From 2014 to 2016 windows of the pension were repeatedly smashed. Eventually a ball bomb landed on the guesthouse’s wooden terrace. Ralf Gorny and a neighbor put out the fire at the last second. Suspects could never be identified.

“I think the topic of danger from the right was underestimated in many ways,” says Kerstin Koeditz, a member of the Left Party’s state parliament in Saxony. “People concentrated on hotspots. At that time it was always Wurzen or Saxon Switzerland. But Colditz? Who knew Colditz?” She criticizes the fact that the “Soko Rex” was systematically reduced in personnel after the 1990s.

Interior committee deals with Colditz

After the raid in the spring, Saxony’s interior committee is now also dealing with Colditz. The question of whether there were threats against police officers in Colditz was also addressed. Officials employed at the time were questioned. There were attempts at intimidation. But all of them should not have been criminally relevant.

MDR Investigative tried to interview those affected from Colditz after the raid. But many fear that the far-right network will continue to be active even after the family’s arrest. MDR Investigative invited twelve current and former residents to a meeting outside of town and guaranteed them anonymity.

Only one person came. From their point of view, many Colditzers have lost the belief that they live in a constitutional state. As long as everything is not examined, including the structures, there will be no peace,” she says. “Other people are needed. Not just the police, Colditz, or the mayor. We have a state government.”

MDR Investigative also wanted to ask the Saxon Interior Minister Armin Schuster (CDU) about the Colditz problem. But after several postponements, the ministry finally said: no time.

attack on youth

The mood in Colditz seems to have hardly changed despite the raid. You could get an impression of this at the city festival in May. Thor Steinar t-shirts and neo-Nazi bands, which could be seen again and again, didn’t seem to bother anyone there. And recordings of MDR Investigative document that there were Hitler salutes and “Heil Hitler” calls after the festival.

A few days later, after research by MDR Investigative Young people from the city-sponsored “Go Team” attacked. The young people who, among other things, organize the U18 elections in Colditz and remove rubbish corners were visited by drunk men in their meeting place. They are said to have been insulted and threatened as “left green dirty”.

According to witnesses, a youth was thrown at a bench and hit in the shoulder; he was also hit in the face. One of the attackers is also said to have made death threats against a supervisor who was called to help. Despite two calls, the police never came. Upon request, the police headquarters in Leipzig said that the officers had not found anyone on site. In the meantime, investigations into assault and threats have been made.