When you lock yourself out of your apartment and have to call the locksmith, that’s annoying. It is even more annoying, however, when the helpers who are called take advantage of the emergency situation and want to rubbish their customers properly. This is exactly what a 28-year-old is said to have done when he accepted an order in the northern district of Ebersberg at the beginning of March 2019. For the work of just a few minutes, the man is said to have asked a proud 449 euros, which is why he had to answer for usury in court on Thursday morning. There, however, he denied having been there at all on the day in question.
That read in the indictment quite differently. There it was said that the accused had taken advantage of the plight of the injured party that Friday evening by asking far too much money for his work. “The bill has exceeded the normal price many times over,” said the prosecutor. There is a noticeable disproportion to the work performed, which is why the 28-year-old, who lives in North Rhine-Westphalia and only commutes to the region every now and then, is condemned for usury.
An assessment that the man’s defense lawyer denied for several reasons: The amount over 449 euros initially appears to be quite expensive, but in Germany there is fundamental freedom of contract. A customer who calls a locksmith orders a complete shop to take home. The process of opening the door is only a small part of the overall performance, and even that is not always easy. “Many locks have to be drilled open,” said the lawyer. In the said case, however, a plastic card was enough to open the closed door again. In any case, a locksmith sometimes provides a service at an inopportune time. “The price is reasonable,” said the defense attorney.
His main argument, however, was that his client had nothing to do with the whole thing. “He wasn’t there.” Even the name on the invoice, the signature and the personal description would not match the 28-year-old. “He is wrongly accused,” the lawyer concluded.
What spoke against his client, however, was the fact that his client’s fingerprints were found on the bill. He couldn’t explain how they got there, said the man to Judge Vera Hörauf. At the time he was living with several other fitters in a room in Munich, possibly because he picked up the document. “My name is always on my bill,” he said in court.
However, the statements of the injured party and their neighbors were decisive in the proceedings. “If you recognize the accused, then the subject is over,” said the prosecutor. However, he soon had to realize that he could not uphold his charges. Because both women testified that the man in the dock was not the one who opened the door that evening. This was “good-looking”, said the neighbor. Although the accused is “not ugly either”, the figure simply does not fit. Judge Hörauf therefore had no choice but to acquit the man.