The group apparently wanted to trigger “civil war-like conditions” and the federal prosecutor’s office has now taken over the case. The men are suspected of forming a terrorist organization.
The federal prosecutor’s office has taken over the investigation into the core of the extremist chat group, which is said to have planned the kidnapping of Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach and a coup. “In connection with the arrest of the accused, there were sufficient indications that the accused could have founded a terrorist organization and/or worked as members of such an organization,” the authority said on Tuesday in Karlsruhe.
This was preceded by extensive investigations by the Attorney General in Koblenz and the Rhineland-Palatinate State Criminal Police Office. They had made the case public in the middle of the month, but had not yet spoken of the suspicion of a terrorist organization. Four Germans from Neustadt an der Weinstrasse (Rhineland-Palatinate), Falkensee near Berlin and from the districts of Landshut (Bavaria) and Ammerland (Lower Saxony) were arrested on April 13. According to the Federal Prosecutor’s Office, three of them are also accused of preparing a serious act of violence that is dangerous to the state and of violating “the Weapons Act and/or War Weapons Control Act”. The quartet is in custody. The Karlsruhe authorities are still investigating a fifth suspect, about whom they have not given any further information.
Attacks on the power supply should apparently lead to a “nationwide blackout”.
According to their statements, the men are suspected of having belonged to a group “which had set itself the goal of triggering civil war-like conditions in Germany and thus ultimately bringing about the overthrow of the federal government and parliamentary democracy”. The name of the group was, among other things, “United Patriots”. The accused had planned a “nationwide blackout” with the damage or destruction of the power supply, it said. In addition, according to the Federal Prosecutor’s Office, SPD Health Minister Lauterbach should “if necessary be violently kidnapped, including killing his bodyguards”.
To implement these plans, at least two men looked for like-minded people in Telegram chat groups from September 2021 and won the three other suspects for their idea. In addition, the two men had tried to procure weapons and explosives for the association. One suspect said he would use his own firearms. Another was primarily concerned with raising funds.