Status: 12/16/2022 11:03 a.m
The case of a speeder convicted of murder in Berlin caused a stir – also because the Federal Court of Justice had initially ordered a new hearing. Now the man failed with a constitutional complaint against his conviction.
Almost seven years after an illegal car race on Berlin’s Kurfürstendamm, the main perpetrator failed with a constitutional complaint against his murder conviction. The Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe announced that the challenged decisions did not violate the plaintiff’s constitutionally guaranteed rights.
The then 26-year-old spontaneously engaged in an illegal race with another driver shortly after midnight on February 1, 2016 in the middle of Berlin on Kurfürstendamm. Both went through several red lights. The main defendant’s car rammed a car coming from a side street at an intersection at 160 to 170 km/h. Its 69-year-old driver died at the scene of the accident. The car had been thrown 70 meters through the air. The two racers were hardly injured.
case caused a stir
The case also caused a stir because the Berlin district court had initially sentenced both speeders to life imprisonment for murder. That had never happened before. The Federal Court of Justice (BGH) overturned this judgment and the cases had to be retried.
The second Berlin trial ended in 2019 with two life sentences for murder. In 2020, the BGH then confirmed this judgment for the first man. The second speeder has now been sentenced to 13 years in prison for attempted murder.
(Az. 2 BvR 1404/20)