Hanau (dpa/lhe) - The appeal process against the father of the Hanau assassin for allegations of insult will be continued this Friday (11:00 a.m.) in front of the Hanau Regional Court. In addition to his statements, the pleadings and the pronouncement of judgment in the proceedings, which were originally scheduled for just one day, are still pending. At the start on Monday, the 75-year-old had rejected the allegations and sometimes violently attacked the court and the public prosecutor's office. He accused public prosecutor Martin Links of "presumed incitement to hatred" and declared that they wanted to "silence him" and ruin him financially.
The man is the father of the 43-year-old German who shot nine people for racist reasons in Hanau on February 19, 2020 before killing his mother and himself. In a criminal complaint, his father is said to have described people who took part in a demonstration near his home - including relatives of the victims of the attack - as "wild strangers". In addition, the public prosecutor's office accuses him of calling a special task force that was deployed in his house on the night of the crime a "terrorist squad" or "terrorist unit" and of having accused Hanau's mayor Claus Kaminsky (SPD), among other things, of "voter deception".
Almost a year ago, the man was sentenced to a fine of 5,400 euros by the Hanau district court for insult in three cases. On the other hand, both he and the public prosecutor, who had demanded a significantly higher fine in the first trial, appealed, so that the case went to the next instance. A psychiatric expert who was present at the trial before the district court found the man to have a delusional disorder with "fighting paranoia" and "querulous delusions" as well as right-wing extremist ideas.
