After the deadly knife attack against a 13-year-old in Monbijoupark in Berlin-Mitte, the conviction of a 43-year-old for murder is final. The 5th Criminal Division of the Federal Court of Justice (BGH) in Leipzig confirmed the life imprisonment imposed by the Berlin Regional Court.
The BGH announced on Thursday that the review did not result in any legal error to the detriment of the accused. The perpetrator and the boy met by chance – the 13-year-old almost bumped into the man’s companion.
The victim’s mother had appealed
In a first trial two years ago, the Berlin district court found the accused guilty of manslaughter. After an appeal by the 13-year-old’s mother, the murder verdict was pronounced in a new trial last summer. According to this, the accused is said to have killed the boy after an irrelevant incident with a powerful knife stab in the heart area “to teach the boy a lesson and to leave the field as a “winner”,” as the BGH statement said. This was considered a low motive.
Heated exchange of words
The man with Turkish citizenship and the Palestinian boy met by chance in a tunnel under the S-Bahn at Monbijoupark at the end of October 2020. The 13-year-old looked at a cell phone and almost bumped into the accused’s companion. There was a short, heated exchange of words, according to the Berlin verdict last year. The accused, a man with a previous record of violent crimes and prone to outbursts of impulses, drew his knife against the unarmed man.
The 13-year-old, who fled to Germany with his family from a refugee camp in Syria as a child, died in the park. In addition, the accused had seriously injured a then 22-year-old companion of the boy. He was therefore also found guilty of dangerous bodily harm – this judgment was already final.