Klagenfurt man stabbed to death: Long prison sentences for young men

They were accused of trying to rob the 30-year-old, and one of the defendants stabbed him 18 times. The verdict was not yet final.

The main perpetrator was sentenced to 17 years in prison for murder and aggravated robbery. The second defendant received eleven years, ten months and 15 days in prison because he had already been sentenced to 45 days of alternative imprisonment for another crime while in custody. “That brings the total sentence to twelve years for you,” explained Judge Uwe Dumpelnik, the chairman of the jury court, in justifying the sentence. The jury had previously answered unanimously yes to the questions as to whether the crimes had been murder and aggravated robbery.

Stabbed four times in the chest

The two men had met in a bar in Klagenfurt on the evening of the crime in January. The first defendant, a Croatian citizen born in Styria, suggested that they could rob the 30-year-old dealer with the second defendant’s folding knife. The Croatian took the knife and entered the apartment, whereupon the dealer stormed towards the 20-year-old.

“The defendant immediately turned on his victim and stabbed him four times in the chest. Because the victim held his hands in front of his body to protect him, further, massive injuries were caused to his arms,” ​​said prosecutor Karin Schweiger in her prosecution statement. In total, the first defendant stabbed 18 times. In her report, forensic doctor Alexandra Meierhofer spoke of “the most powerful, massive acts of violence” – although the knife had a blade length of only ten centimeters, it caused severe internal injuries. The last stab was in the 30-year-old’s back, and the tip of the knife also broke off.

“I never wanted to kill him”

After the 30-year-old stopped moving, the Croatian climbed over the dying man, took a mini fridge in which he suspected drugs, and fled with the second defendant, who had been waiting behind him in the stairwell. While the accomplice was arrested by the police soon after the crime, the Croatian had his girlfriend pick him up. He drove home, hid the fridge, which had no drugs in it, in the basement, washed himself and changed his clothes. He then returned to the city, met up with friends and was later arrested on the way home.

“I never wanted to kill him. I knew that I had injured him, but I can only remember two or three stab wounds. Then I was as if I had been knocked out,” the first defendant stated in his interrogation. He said that he had only wanted to take the knife with him to intimidate his victim. He said that he could no longer really remember the course of events, when the prosecutor confronted him with the victim’s massive injuries: “How is a person supposed to survive that?” she asked. “I didn’t think he would bleed to death,” the defendant replied.

“Extremely naive”

His Austrian accomplice, who was only charged with aggravated robbery, had not pleaded guilty at all at the start of the trial. When it was time to clarify what crime had actually been planned, he initially said that he had not known what the other defendant had planned. When he became increasingly entangled in contradictions, his defense attorney pulled the emergency brake and asked for a meeting with his client – with the result that the second defendant finally pleaded guilty to the robbery.

The defense attorney for the first defendant emphasized in his closing statement that his client had in no way planned a murder. Rather, he had “acted extremely naively” and had no experience with a knife as a weapon: “He thought he would surprise the victim, but as we now know, that was not the case. He found himself in a situation that he had not expected and in which he was completely overwhelmed.”

“The act was a massacre”

Prosecutor Schweiger had previously said that many defendants in murder trials would choose to accept responsibility like the first defendant. However, everything points to murder in this case, and the crime was a “massacre,” she explained, referring to the crime scene photos that were shown during the trial – and the fact that both defendants were covered in blood from head to toe after the crime. “I believe that he is sorry,” the prosecutor said to the first defendant, “but at the moment of the crime there is nothing to suggest that he believed that his victim would come out alive.” She had “no doubt that there was a conditional intent to kill.”