The succession of large fires kept the market town of Mainleus (Kulmbach district) on tenterhooks at the beginning of the year. Now the Bayreuth Regional Court has sentenced three defendants to prison terms, some of them for several years. One adult defendant was sentenced to a total prison term of four years, and one young adult defendant to a youth sentence of four years. A third defendant was sentenced to a total prison term of 23 months on probation. The men admitted to the arson in court.
According to the indictment, the three men set fire to two houses in Mainleus with Molotov cocktails in January and February 2024. One was about to be demolished, the other was uninhabited at the time of the fire. Both houses burned down, and according to investigators, there was extensive property damage – at least 100,000 euros in one of the two houses alone.
The investigation also revealed that the arsonists tried to set fire to a hardware store one evening in January 2024. When they failed, they threw a Molotov cocktail at a nearby gas station. Passers-by managed to extinguish the incendiary device.
Two of the three men now convicted were previously active in the volunteer fire service. The third ran several “emergency fire pages” on social networks, where he reported on fires. He went to the scene of fire operations and later published photos and videos of the firefighting operations on the Internet.
According to the indictment, the men had agreed that it would be interesting if the fire brigade were to be called out again because of a fire in Mainleus.