Image: VOLKER Weihbold
The trial of a 22-year-old murder case in which an Italian was killed in 2001 ended Tuesday in the Graz Regional Criminal Court with a guilty verdict and an acquittal. The accused man was found guilty by the jury. The alleged client, on the other hand, was narrowly acquitted. The judgment is not final.
The man, who is said to have acted as the direct perpetrator at the time, was sentenced to 19.5 years in prison by the court. The eight jurors found him guilty by a vote of six to two. In the case of the accused Slovakian, who was listed as the suspect, the jury did not reach a majority: they voted four to four and the woman was therefore to be acquitted.
Accused denied to the end
From the start, the public prosecutor spoke of an act of greed, and the accused denied everything until the end. The woman is said to have robbed the Italian, who fell in love with her in the late 1990s, of all his money. When the Slovakian, who lives in her homeland, demanded more and more money and life insurance from him for her daughter, the Italian, who also lives in Slovakia, threatened to press charges. An acquaintance of the woman is said to have had the idea of luring the Italian to Austria and killing him in Styria. The man was killed in Sinabelkirchen in Styria. The planner and one of the immediate perpetrators were sentenced to 17 and 18 years in prison for murder in 2019.
Since January, the alleged client and the second alleged direct perpetrator had also had to answer in Graz. However, they denied any connection with the murder of the Italian. In his closing speech, the public prosecutor spoke of a “very complex procedure because it was a long time ago and it would be an ice-cold contract killing”. He saw a “set of evidence and testimonies” that would incriminate the two defendants. The question of life insurance as a motive for the crime hovers over the process. It was about 200,000 euros: “That’s still a lot of money today, but in 2001 in Slovakia it was a fortune,” said the prosecutor. He did not doubt that the two are guilty.
In her closing speech, the man’s defense attorney said that the prosecution would essentially be based on witness statements, but some of these descriptions were “questionable and almost adventurous”. She also found the investigations in Slovakia “patchy”. She believes some have “made up some rumours” to implicate the two. She emphasized that in case of doubt the accused should be acquitted.
The Slovakian’s lawyer, on the other hand, was convinced that the first accused had his own reason for killing the Italian: “All the witnesses who say that my client was supposed to have been commissioned come from his environment.” The defense attorney saw only “a few pieces of evidence”, the rest are indications that can be interpreted in one direction.
Source: Nachrichten
