For her it was pure torture: In his shared room, a 21-year-old beat his younger sister for months and finally forced her to commit incest. The Constance Regional Court sentenced him to four years and six months in prison.
The judge found him guilty of five counts of rape, ten counts of aggravated assault and 40 counts of intentional assault. The verdict is not yet legally binding. According to the indictment, the crimes took place between January and May 2022 in Constance.
The 21-year-old hit his sister almost every day at the time. In a video interrogation, the then 18-year-old reported being hit by a cable on her back and burned with a knife and an iron. He is said to have poured citric acid on burns on his feet so that she felt even more pain.
“I was the scapegoat for everything that bothered him,” she said in the interrogation. “He took all his anger out on me.” In court, she had exercised her right to refuse to testify.
Nobody noticed anything
He is said to have raped the young woman on five evenings in May. According to a police officer, the two roommates had no idea of the crimes – just like the parents of the two. He is said to have always told them that his sister was fine with him.
Her brother brought her to Konstanz because she was supposed to help him move from one flat share to another. The teenager lived with her parents and five other siblings in a refugee camp in Schwäbisch Gmünd. The man came to Germany from Syria in November 2015. His family followed in 2021.
The 21-year-old was arrested on May 13 after a tip from the police in Schwäbisch Gmünd. The officials had to arrive at the accommodation because of him. There he is said to have physically abused his other younger sisters and brothers. But there was no sexual assault.
Defense pleaded for acquittal
The 21-year-old did not want to comment on the allegations at the beginning of the trial last Thursday. Prosecutors had asked for a prison sentence of five years and six months. The defense pleaded for acquittal.
A look at the police crime statistics shows that the offense is not an isolated case. Since 2018, the Baden-Württemberg State Criminal Police Office has counted twelve female victims of rape by a brother. In 2021 there were 34 cases nationwide.
