Not legally binding

Police officer tortured and murdered: Life imprisonment

The accused is said to belong to the terrorist organization "Badr Brigade".

(Bild: AFP PHOTO / FADEL SENNA)

A 33-year-old man stood trial in Graz for allegedly kidnapping, torturing and shooting a police officer in Baghdad as a member of a terrorist organization. He did not feel guilty and insisted for four days of the trial that he had been mistaken for his brother. But the web of lies collapsed. On Monday, he was sentenced to life imprisonment.

In 2015, the accused is said to have kidnapped a Sunni police officer as a member of the Shiite Badr organization. The victim was tortured - they pulled off his toenails and fingernails - and then killed with three shots to the back of the head. Prior to this, the terrorists had extorted 45,000 US dollars, which the family paid.

Death penalty threatens in home country
There is even an Iraqi arrest warrant for the asylum seeker, who lives in Graz. However, extradition is out of the question because he faces the death penalty in his home country. The Graz Regional Criminal Court must therefore conduct the proceedings for murder and kidnapping as terrorist offenses. Accomplices of the 33-year-old have already been sentenced in Baghdad.

The Badr organization, to which the accused is said to have belonged, played a major role in the trial. "It waged a bloodthirsty war against the Sunnis, the largest religious group in Islam," explained the public prosecutor in his plea. The terrorist militia financed itself through kidnappings.

Known for kidnapping and murder
The renowned Islamism expert Guido Steinberg explained in one of the previous hearings that the accused is more likely to belong to another, even worse militia: "The League of the Righteous", Steinberg suspects. Photos on the 33-year-old's cell phone would indicate this. "This militia is better known for kidnapping their victims, torturing them, collecting ransom money for them and then murdering them anyway."

On Monday, the fourth day of the trial since February 2023, a live video interrogation of the accused's brother from Iraq was to be conducted. The 33-year-old had initially claimed during the trial that it was not him but his brother who was responsible for the atrocities.

Guard service during kidnapping admitted
However, as the interrogation could not take place in the Austrian embassy in Baghdad, but only before an Iraqi court, the accused did not want his brother to be put under any pressure. In the end, however, the accused admitted to lying anyway - out of pure fear, as he claimed. And between the lines, he also admitted to a kind of "lookout service" during the kidnapping.

The 33-year-old has been in custody since February 2022. Now, after more than a year of trial, the (non-final) sentence has been handed down: life imprisonment.