Back in Court

All seven “young guys” had already been behind bars

All seven were brought before the court from pretrial detention(Bild: C. Handl, Krone KREATIV)

The seven milk boys faced charges for numerous crimes at the Linz Regional Court. The main offense committed by the 15- to 17-year-olds: they had stolen cars from repair shops and garages “just for fun” and gone on joyrides with them. The verdicts were still pending on Friday.

Seven delinquent “kids”—all between the ages of 15 and 17—crowded into the dock at the Linz Regional Court on Friday. This place is anything but unfamiliar to the boys from Linz and Vienna: Every single one of the youths not only has multiple prior convictions but has also already spent several months in custody. With the exception of the oldest, they are all high school dropouts who have never worked a day in their lives. The sister of the main defendant was also charged—but she was not present.

Each with multiple prior convictions
Instead, they spent the whole day hanging out with their “bad friends”: “All I thought about was getting into trouble,” said one of the defendants. And that’s exactly what they did: Their prior convictions range from making dangerous threats to burglary and coercion to aggravated armed robbery.

Six of the seven defendants are high school dropouts—only one, not pictured here, worked briefly at a supermarket.(Bild: C. Handl, Krone KREATIV)

Caused significant damage
On Friday, however, they were in court for a different crime—one that seems to be particularly popular right now: The defendants had been stealing cars in various groups—preferably from auto repair shops, where they stole the keys from safes on the exterior walls. Because these young hooligans, almost all of whom have an immigrant background, specifically targeted premium vehicles from BMW, Mercedes-Benz, and Audi—and in some cases abandoned the cars somewhere in a battered condition—the damage was correspondingly extensive.

Fully confessed, but . . .
Exactly how high the damage was had to be determined during the course of the trial. The prosecution had charged them with commercial aggravated theft—to which the “kids” largely confessed. However, they all denied intent to enrich themselves—they claimed they were aware that they could not have kept the vehicles. Instead, they said, it was all about the “thrill.” Sentences for the gang were still pending as of Friday, however.