Alleged attempt at cover-up
Possible motive for the police murder in Kusel: What penalties threaten poachers in Germany
A hunter holds his rifle at dusk
© Friso Gentsch / DPA
Murder two cops to avoid poaching charges? In the case of the two police officers who were killed in the Kusel district, the investigators are at least assuming this is the motive. But what consequences do poachers have to fear in Germany?
The death of two young police officers shook all of Germany. Two suspects have since been arrested. The two 32 and 38-year-old men are accused of having shot a 24-year-old police officer and a 29-year-old chief inspector during a traffic check early Monday morning in the Rhineland-Palatinate district of Kusel. The Saarlanders are now in custody on suspicion of joint murder. A possible motive for the crime: The men could have tried to cover up a crime of poaching by killing the officials.
Trunk full of dead animals
During searches in several houses, apartments, business premises and a hunting lodge in Saarland, more than a dozen firearms were found – probably including the murder weapons. The authorities initially did not provide any information as to whether one of the two arrested men was listed in the National Weapons Register as a “permit holder”. They spoke on Wednesday of “very extensive investigations”.
According to information from the German Hunting Association, the 38-year-old was refused a hunting license in 2020 due to a lack of reliability. The investigating judge assumes that the accused committed the crime together in order to cover up previous poaching, said senior public prosecutor Stefan Orthen at a press conference in Kaiserslautern on Tuesday. The suspect’s trunk was full of dead animals on the morning of the crime.
Serious case of poaching: up to five years imprisonment – murder: life imprisonment
According to the current catalog of fines, there is a fine of 500 to 1500 euros for hunting without a hunting license. Offenses such as killing game during the closed season or hunting on someone else’s property can cost between 50 and 1000 euros.
“As a rule, the penalties for poaching are in the range of a suspended sentence,” Benjamin Grunst, a specialist lawyer for criminal law, told T-Online. The professional consequences for those convicted often far outweigh the punishment itself, since their firearms or trade license could be withdrawn.
However, poaching can also result in much harsher penalties. Because in “particularly serious” cases, according to Section 292 of the Criminal Code, there is a risk of imprisonment of up to five years. “A particularly serious case is usually when the crime is committed commercially or habitually; at night, during the closed season, using slings or in another non-weedmanlike way or by several participants equipped with firearms,” it says further in the legal text. The investigators said there were indications that the suspects were poaching professionally and commercially – which would speak for a serious case of poaching.
Usually, Grunst told T-Online, very few convicted poachers end up behind bars for several years. “The law doesn’t protect the animals, but the hunting areas. So it’s about protecting property rights,” explains the specialist lawyer.
So if the two men actually shot the police officers to cover up their illegal hunt, they would have miscalculated: because the law provides for life imprisonment for murder.
Poaching has increased in Germany
Hunting poaching has increased slightly in Germany in recent years: the Federal Criminal Police Office registered 1,080 such cases in the police crime statistics for all of Germany in 2020. The highest level in the statistics, which have been kept since 1987, was in 1996 with 1,502 cases. “There is certainly an unreported number,” says Torsten Reinwald from the German Hunting Association.
Commercial poaching, which was probably intended to be covered up in the case of the murdered police officers, has never come before him. The brutality and cold-bloodedness of the alleged poachers and murderers stunned him. “There hasn’t been a dimension like this in Germany at least in the last 30 years.” “It’s difficult to do commercial poaching in Germany,” said Reinwald. The police and hunters worked closely together because of the wildlife accidents.
sources: dpa; afp; criminal code; Catalog of fines for animal welfare; T-On-line