In a tweet, a man had described Hamburg’s interior senator as “so 1 dick”. In the overall context, the insult did not weigh heavily enough for a search, the Hanseatic city’s district court ruled.
The search of an apartment in connection with the so-called Pimmelgate affair involving Hamburg’s Interior Senator Andy Grote (SPD) in September last year was unlawful. This was decided by the district court of the Hanseatic city. A spokesman confirmed a report by Hamburger Abendblatt. The district court had allowed the search of an apartment where the author of a tweet that Grote felt offended used to live. According to the district court, however, this was disproportionate. The owner of the apartment and former partner of the author had lodged a complaint.
The whole thing was triggered by a tweet addressed to Grote with the words “You’re such a dick”. The interior senator had previously described people who had celebrated in the Schanzenviertel despite Corona as “ignorant” and “stupid” on Twitter. At the beginning of the pandemic, Grote himself celebrated in a pub in violation of the Corona rules and had to pay a fine for it. Nonetheless, he filed a lawsuit.
In view of Grote’s behavior, the severity of the insult is “rather at the lower end of the threshold of relevance,” the regional court found in its decision of July 27. The search was unreasonable. After the operation, the police and left-wing autonomists played a cat-and-mouse game. The slogan “Andy, you’re such a dick” could be read again and again on a large poster at the Rote Flora cultural center. He was painted over several times by the police. The investigation against the tweet author was discontinued due to a lack of public interest in criminal prosecution.