Two life sentences

Vienna attack: High prison sentences for accomplices

(Bild: P. Huber)

On Wednesday, three men were again found guilty at the Vienna Regional Court in connection with the terrorist attack in Vienna. Not only were they accomplices to the quadruple murder - this conviction was already legally binding - they were also members of the terrorist organization IS. This was the verdict reached by the eight jurors. The three were ultimately sentenced to 20 years and two life sentences respectively. The reason for the retrial was a partial overturning of the verdict by the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court criticized errors in the legal instructions given to the jury and insufficiently specific wording of the verdict, which is why the verdict from February 2023 was partially overturned. However, the convictions for accessory to murder were not affected.

First verdict in February 2023
In February 2023, the now 23-year-old received a 19-year prison sentence for handling the purchase of weapons and ammunition and establishing contact with the arms broker. As he was still a young adult at the time of the offense, the maximum sentence in his case would have been 20 years. A 25-year-old who supported the assassin from May 2020 until the day of the attack, knowing of his intentions, helped select the target and made preparations for the escape by obtaining forged documents, received a 20-year sentence. The 29-year-old who had encouraged the later assassin to carry out the attack up until the day of the attack and had prepared the murder weapons, including ammunition and other paraphernalia, in the assassin's apartment, received a life sentence.

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Wednesday's trial was exclusively about whether they were also members of a terrorist organization. Essentially, the only question was whether they were part of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist organization. The defendants pleaded not guilty to this. Naturally, the public prosecutor's office took a different view. "It is incontrovertible that the three are perpetrators of multiple murders. Only the punishment is still in your hands (...). You will have to be sentenced in the strongest possible terms," she addressed the jury in her closing statement, calling for the maximum penalty. For two of the defendants, there is also the question of whether they sent IS propaganda. The prosecutor did not believe that the defendants had distanced themselves from the radical Islamist ideology. "The ideology of IS is the top priority for the defendants."

"How much does his guilt weigh?"
"How much does his guilt weigh?" was the central question posed to the jury in the closing statement by Zaid Rauf, the 25-year-old's defense lawyer. He appealed for a lighter sentence than the 20 years his client had received in the first trial. "What weighs so much that you take 20 years away from someone? Even if he had done nothing, even if he had not known the assassin, the attack would have happened."

For example, his client's comment on a confessional posting by the assassin with "Jeje" (as much as "jaja", note) was interpreted as a psychological contribution to the crime. "Do you think that if he (the assassin, editor's note) hadn't gotten the 'Jeje', he would have turned around and gone home?" he said, considering the sentence excessive. "Give him a few years back," he asked the jury.

"You can no longer punish the main offender"
Elmar Kresbach, the 29-year-old's defense lawyer, pointed out - as he had often done during the trial - that "the main perpetrator can no longer be punished" because the assassin died in the attack. The great danger is that "we want to see someone punished, but cannot punish the actual perpetrator". However, "we must leave the church in the village", he said, demanding a much lighter sentence for his client. The 23-year-old's defense lawyer also agreed with the statements of the two previous speakers. "Just because someone is a believer, I can't accuse them of being a member of a terrorist organization."

His client then took the floor himself at the end and brought up a judicial error that has not yet been addressed. He himself received 19 years for establishing contact with the arms broker. The latter in turn received a life sentence. The actual arms dealer, on the other hand, got off with a nine-month suspended sentence, as the proceedings concerning the assault rifle were wrongly dropped and the Slovenian could ultimately only be prosecuted for a handgun. "That makes me wonder where justice lies," said the defendant. Shortly before 2:30 p.m., the jury convened to deliberate on the questions put to them.

Gun broker jailed for life
Those three men were joined in the dock by three others from November 2022 to February 2023. The arms broker was sentenced to life imprisonment; the appeal against the sentence was not upheld by the Vienna Higher Regional Court in January of this year and the sentence is final. The trial of two men who were acquitted of accessory to murder but convicted of membership of a terrorist organization also had to be retried. They ultimately received 18 and 21 months respectively, six and seven of which were unconditional.