Trial in Munich: 14 years imprisonment for knife attack in ICE

Islamist or mentally ill? This question was the subject of the legal investigation into a knife attack on four travelers in an ICE to Nuremberg. Now the judges have pronounced a verdict: The perpetrator must be in prison for 14 years.

After the knife attack on four passengers in an ICE, the accused was sentenced to 14 years in prison. The Munich Higher Regional Court found the man guilty of attempted murder and dangerous bodily harm, among other things. The then 27-year-old attacked four men with a knife in an ICE on the way to Nuremberg in November last year and seriously injured three of them.

Dispute about liability

The question of a possible jihadist background and a possible mental illness of the Palestinian national who grew up in Syria was at the center of the two-month process in Munich. The federal prosecutor’s office had assumed a radical Islamist background to the crime and had demanded life imprisonment in the closing argument last week. In their opinion, the man is only simulating a mental illness. Federal prosecutor Silke Ritzert said in her plea that he committed the bloody crime “in a state of full criminal responsibility” and wanted to make his contribution to the global jihad.

The defense, on the other hand, sees their client as an incapacitated, paranoid schizophrenic and pleaded for an acquittal and placement in a psychiatric hospital. Three psychiatric experts had previously agreed in the process that the man was not mentally ill. The court also agreed with this interpretation: The chamber could rule out paranoid schizophrenia, the man was in fact controllable.

The hearing before the Munich Higher Regional Court lasted around two months. During the 20 days of the hearing, the victims, witnesses and various experts, among others, were heard.