The eyewitness appears increasingly unsettled and agitated while being questioned by the judge, often stating that she cannot remember exactly. “I have Long Covid and unfortunately therefore have severe memory gaps.”
But there must have been something else that happened on Friday morning in front of the court. She’s afraid, says the 30-year-old when asked how she’s doing today. Before she testified, she was filmed by two men outside the courthouse. “I don’t know why. They weren’t in the press.” her voice breaks. According to her statement, she can be picked up, she says. “You’re just afraid that you’ll be threatened or that your family will be threatened.”
The judge asks whether these men are in the courtroom today. The woman looks around, shakes her head. Minutes later she recognizes her. They are Jérôme Boateng’s bodyguards. The public prosecutor requested that the hearing be interrupted and the personal details of the two men determined.
At the time, the eyewitness had been questioned for almost an hour in the jury courtroom of the Munich Higher Regional Court, it was about the Caribbean vacation with Jérôme Boateng in 2018. During the trip, the professional footballer is said to have thrown a glass lantern at his ex-girlfriend Sherin S., her slapped her face, bit her head, spat on her, and insulted her. In the first instance, he was sentenced to a fine of 1.8 million euros for punching Sherin S. in the face. The witness is a friend of Sherin S.
Boateng’s lawyer again rejects an agreement
As in the first trial before the district court, Boateng is accompanied by three beefy men in dark clothing. Boateng not only goes the short way from the dark van to the court with an escort, the 1.92 meter tall footballer is also picked up by two men and taken out of the room during every break in the process.
While Boateng had a lawyer represent him in the first trial, he upgraded for the appeal process. Now he is sitting in the dock between two defense attorneys, his family lawyer and a trainee lawyer who was only assigned to take notes. A quite intimidating scenario for witnesses.
Boateng’s defender Peter Zuriel is trying to clarify the situation. The men who filmed were employees of a private security service. They “find out about Mr. Boateng’s environment, see how much press there is,” so they would also film to send these recordings to their headquarters, “where the security situation would be assessed.” The eyewitness was not the target of the recordings, “she just happened to be in the picture and can only be seen from behind,” says Zuriel.
When asked by SZ, a court spokeswoman said that the court was not aware that a private security company was filming on the court premises. The public prosecutor will examine to what extent these film recordings are permitted.
At the beginning of the second day of negotiations in the appeal process, the presiding judge Boateng again asked whether he had “slept and thought” about an agreement and thus a drastic reduction in the process. “Just slept,” Boateng’s lawyer replied. An agreement is out of the question for the footballer – and so the tedious taking of evidence continues on November 2nd.