Brass usually play where the judge sits. And the strings of the Nuremberg Philharmonic squat during their concerts in the Meistersingerhalle where lawyers from the plaintiff and defendant have now taken their seats. Because of the circumstances, it is an extraordinary process that began on Tuesday at the – outsourced – Nuremberg District Court. Owners want to have reimbursed 15.7 million euros from their former property management, because, in their opinion, they did not behave correctly when it came to the question of whether the facade of five high-rise buildings would be torn down due to the alleged fire hazard.
A procedure in the Meistersingerhalle, which can hold 2100 people? Sounds oversized, but once you’ve noticed the emotions triggered by the demolition of the façades in November 2018, you’ll understand the choice of location. Hundreds of owners are affected, and there is talk of up to 50,000 euros that the replacement of allegedly flammable facades cost individual owners. This is all the more serious as the houses in Nuremberg-Neuselsbrunn are not known for attracting wealthy residents – and the demolition has left disturbed owners behind. For many people, moisture penetrated their homes during the cold season, resulting in mold, not to mention the stress on the nerves.
It is true that there are actually only a few dozen listeners who come to the gigantic hall, the dispute that has been dragging on for years is likely to have cost many a nerve. Those who have come, however, are carefully instructed by the local judge Ursula Krome in the usages of a court case. You are now sitting in a concert hall, any expressions of applause should nevertheless be refrained from, and the opposite as well. In the auditorium, probably the largest courtroom in the history of Nuremberg, it remained surprisingly quiet during the trial. On the other hand, on the stage, which in this case actually is one, it gets turbulent for hours.
Immediate clearance or façade demolition?
It is not uncommon in civil proceedings for two sides to be convinced that they are right. In this case, however, the worlds of interpretation collide. The former property management company has a total of six defense attorneys and assistants to argue that the property managers have done everything right. One of the lawyers does not switch off his microphone at all in between, so much does he feel obliged to admit his view of the case on the record.
According to him, there was no alternative for the administrators. Experts had clearly established that flammable material – namely styrofoam – was found in the layers of house facades from the 1960s. The city of Nuremberg is said to have informed the administration that there are only two options: immediate evacuation or demolition of the facade. At an owners’ meeting it was then clearly signaled that evacuation was out of the question for the residents. So demolition. It was about “life and limb”, to question this now, is an unbelievable distortion of the facts, complain the representatives of the management company. Between the lines there is always the disaster at London’s Grenfell Tower, where a total of 72 people died in a high-rise fire in June 2017. “Who would have taken responsibility for a fire,” asks a company representative – and then pushes in the direction of the judge and the opposing side: “You?”
One man had hoped for clarity – in vain
The other side, the lawyers for the owners, already consider the basic assumption that the facade was supposedly combustible to have not been proven. After all, the styrofoam was “encapsulated” in the facade and the combustibility of the entire material had not been adequately proven at the time of the demolition. On another point, the judge indicated on this first day of the hearing, the proceedings could actually fall on the defendants’ feet. Apparently there was no explicit decision at the owners’ meeting that the facade had to be torn down. It was only decided that 1.5 million euros should be made available for immediate measures.
On this first day, the judge made no secret of the fact that, in her view, the management company had “basically made itself liable for damages”. In the hall, this ensures a sigh of relief. “Finally clarity,” was the hope for a man at the beginning of the process, whose son had to take 40,000 euros into his hands to renovate the facade of an originally 60,000 euros apartment. However, the man does not get any clarity on this day, the next appointment is set for December 17th. Of course, not even the judge believes that the proceedings will be over then. “I know that I am writing my decision in favor of the trash can here at the district court,” she says at the hearing, “because you are going to the second instance anyway.”