It is well known that wild posting can be expensive – this also applies to the Internet. A 57-year-old from the western district of Ebersberg had to experience this. She was accused of posting a wanted poster-style image on a social network in late 2021. This represents a call to crime and an insult, the district court found and issued the woman with a penalty order of 1,400 euros. She lodged an objection to this, which is why the main hearing now took place.
The background is the criticism of the Corona measures in force at the time, content like the poster in question was particularly popular with the so-called lateral thinker movement. Numerous politicians and business people were advertised for “arrest”. These were labeled “terrorists” on the poster in question and, according to the inscription, should be locked up in order to finally restore the freedom of all citizens.
The defendant claims her account was hacked by strangers
The accused protested in court that he had nothing to do with the whole matter. She is neither involved in politics nor does she go to any demos. She explained that the picture in question had been shared from her profile on the network with a hacker attack. She has therefore already contacted the operator of the service, but he has not yet responded.
Judge Vera Hörauf wanted to know from the accused whether she had at least changed her password after she suspected her profile had been hacked. She said no, but didn’t seem to have understood the question either. All of her acquaintances would no longer be found if she changed her account now, the defendant said. Instead, she talked at length about the fact that she only started social media because of Corona “like we were all locked up so that you have a distraction”. Others had become depressed during this time, the defendant continued.
According to the defendant, she did not delete the post in question, she did not create it
The prosecutor asked whether she had at least deleted the post in question. She couldn’t do that, the defendant replied, after all she didn’t set it herself, it was the hacker. However, who apparently left it at this one action, the accused said when asked further.
For the prosecutor, the statement of the accused was not credible. She demanded a fine of 80 daily rates of ten euros each. The accused, who had appeared without a lawyer, demanded acquittal, after all there was no evidence against her, only suspicions.
The chairman, on the other hand, followed the arguments of the public prosecutor’s office and sentenced the accused to 75 daily rates of ten euros each. Both the image in question and the claim that it was posted by an unknown hacker “run through several procedures here, that’s the standard excuse”. The defendant loudly announced that he wanted to appeal while the verdict was being given.