Murder trial
Act of violence at Neuschwanstein: Life sentence demanded
The American accused of murder in the Kempten regional court. photo
© Karl-Josef Hildenbrand/dpa
A tourist is said to have attacked two women for sexual reasons near the world-famous Neuschwanstein Castle. A woman dies after the attack. The pleas are held during the trial.
In the trial of the violent crime against two American tourists Neuschwanstein Castle with one fatality, the public prosecutor’s office has demanded a life sentence for the defendant. The public prosecutor also asked the Kempten regional court for a conditional preventive detention for the 31-year-old American, who is on trial for murder, rape resulting in death and attempted murder.
In this case, the court can order preventive detention at a later date. The public prosecutor saw the defendant as having a “disdain for human life.”
The parents of the woman killed at the age of 21 were also in the courtroom for the first time. There they followed the trial and the reading of a letter from the survivors. The woman reported that she was still extremely afraid of attacks from her male counterparts and the defendant. “I feel like I died on the slope below,” she wrote.
According to the prosecution, the vacationer met the two women on June 14, 2023 during a hike near the Marienbrücke near the world-famous Neuschwanstein Castle in Schwangau and after a few minutes they were brutally attacked for sexual reasons. The American is said to have strangled and raped the younger woman, and is also said to have pushed both victims down a slope approximately 50 meters deep. After the attack, the 21-year-old died in hospital, and her companion, who was one year older, was seriously injured.
At the beginning of the trial, the 31-year-old made a statement through his lawyer in which he admitted large parts of the allegations. As he had done for large parts of the previous trial, the defendant followed the public prosecutor’s plea largely motionless and with his head bowed.