When people want to relieve stress, they exercise, some meditate, others consume. Ibrahim S. takes off his clothes. He opens his pants and harasses women in public. Exhibitionism is a pathological tendency, and in the eyes of district judge Ines Tauscher, Ibrahim S., who has been convicted several times, appears more self-pitying than empathetic and willing to receive therapy. “It’s not easy for me to send you to prison,” she tells the father of two. And then it does. “Too much has accumulated.”
The Federal Central Register lists 16 entries for the 32-year-old: At the age of 14, it started with dangerous bodily harm, then robbery, gang theft, fraud – and from 2015 onwards three convictions for exhibitionism, most recently on probation in 2019. The probation period was even extended twice because S. committed another crime.
He was still under probation in spring 2022 when he exposed himself in front of a 17-year-old in S8, sought eye contact and masturbated. In the Olympic swimming pool, he stared at a woman who was blow-drying in the changing rooms, dropped his towel and walked naked around the woman. When she fled, he even ran after her. “I was very scared,” the woman told the police.
Things fared even worse for two young holidaymakers who wanted to take the S-Bahn back to their Munich hotel shortly before midnight after a visit to the Erding thermal baths. Ibrahim S. sat down diagonally across from her in the compartment, fixed her with a stare and unzipped his pants. The women fled to employees of the Erding thermal baths, whom they had recently seen in the swimming pool and who were also sitting on the train. One of them pressed an alarm button, causing the train to stand at a station for a longer period of time.
Why didn’t the railway employees intervene? It was almost closing time, they say
Then two railway security employees arrived. “They didn’t take it seriously,” said one of the victims. They went to Ibrahim S. and asked: “What is this going to be? Like a striptease?” They didn’t do anything more. The train continued on – with Ibrahim S. and the two frightened women. They feared that S. might follow them. The thermal spa employee then gave them her telephone number, and after the women got out, they maintained telephone contact all the way to the hotel.
“Who knows whether the other two acts would have happened if DB Security had acted differently,” says Judge Tauscher. The two were actually located and stated that it was one statement against another and that it was almost closing time.
Sometimes he didn’t like the group therapy, then the individual therapist wasn’t a good fit. Ibrahim S. speaks quietly – and circles around himself. Yes, he says, maybe he wants to earn admiration from women with his actions. “You only create disgust and fear,” says the judge. Defense attorney Ömer Sahinci pleads for a suspended sentence. His client is in therapy and has tablets that immediately curb his urges. But Judge Tauscher sentenced S. to one year and four months in prison. After the hearing, Sahinci said he wanted to appeal.