Planned Lauterbach kidnapping: Alleged terrorist group charged

As of: 01/23/2023 4:22 p.m

The federal prosecutor’s office has filed charges against a suspected terrorist group. Among other things, she is said to have planned the kidnapping of Federal Minister of Health Lauterbach (SPD). The trial is to take place at the Koblenz Higher Regional Court.

Federal prosecutors have filed charges against a suspected terrorist group that is said to have planned the overthrow of the federal government and the kidnapping of Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach (SPD). The trial against the four men and one woman, who have been in custody since last year, is to take place at the Koblenz Higher Regional Court, as the Karlsruhe authority announced.

All of the accused are accused of preparing a highly treasonable undertaking against the federal government. The investigators assume that the group came together by January 2022 at the latest – with the aim of “triggering civil war-like conditions in Germany by means of violence and at least accepting casualties and thus bring about the overthrow of the federal government and parliamentary democracy”.

Plans for an authoritarian system of government

In their place, an authoritarian system of government based on the model of the German Empire should be established again. The prelude to this should be explosive attacks on the power supply, which should cause a longer nationwide power blackout.

According to the indictment, Health Minister Lauterbach was then kidnapped in an armed attack, with his bodyguards possibly being killed. According to their own ideas, the group wanted to use the resulting chaos to set up a “constituent assembly” in Berlin and to depose the government. It was also planned that an actor should imitate the Federal President on television.

Nationwide searches

The four men were arrested on April 13, 2022 at various locations in Germany. This was preceded by a meeting between one of the men and an undercover investigator about a weapons deal. A number of firearms and ammunition, cash, gold bars, silver coins and foreign currency were seized during nationwide searches. A little later, the federal prosecutor’s office took over the investigation.

In mid-October, she also had a retired teacher arrested in Saxony, who is said to have held a higher position in the group. According to earlier information, those arrested in April came from Neustadt an der Weinstrasse (Rhineland-Palatinate), Falkensee near Berlin and from the districts of Landshut (Bavaria) and Ammerland (Lower Saxony). They are assigned to the so-called Reich Citizens Scene.

With information from Holger Schmidt, ARD terrorism expert

Charges brought against mutm Lauterbach kidnapper

Holger Schmidt, SWR, 23.1.2023 4:43 p.m

source site