RAF terrorist is accused of several robberies

This article first appeared at ntv.de.

The Verden public prosecutor’s office has completed its indictment against the former RAF terrorist Daniela Klette. In it she accuses her of 13 robberies of supermarkets and cash-in-transit vehicles, as “Spiegel” reports. Together with her two accomplices Burkhard Garweg and Ernst-Volker Staub, who are still on the run, she is said to have stolen 2.76 million euros. According to the authorities, they rented apartments in Bremen, Hanover, Hildesheim, Braunschweig and Northeim for their months-long preparations. According to the report, Klette’s defense attorneys do not want to comment on the allegations.

As the magazine further reports, the trio spied on 38 supermarkets and a bank in Bremen. This emerges from the 696-page indictment against Klette. Before the failed robbery of a cash-in-transit truck in Stuhr near Bremen, Klette rented an apartment in Bremen’s Steintorviertel several times under the name “Sarah Lopez”, which she paid for in cash.

After Klette’s arrest in February 2024, the police discovered research material on possible targets for robberies in her apartment in Berlin-Kreuzberg, as well as weapons, ammunition, cash and gold, it is said. These included notes on emergency exits and “cabuffs”, as the perpetrators called the cash registers, on possible escape routes and expected income. The robberies attributed to the trio took place on busy days, before or after public holidays. The three themselves had recorded patrols of nearby police stations.

According to further information, the public prosecutor’s office also assumes that there was an accomplice in the alleged robberies of Klette, Garweg and Staub. Specifically, it is said to be Garweg’s girlfriend at the time. The suspicion arose from seized messages between Garweg and the woman, which were in connection with two robberies on a supermarket in Celle in September 2011 and a cash-in-transit truck in Wolfsburg in December 2015.

According to the prosecution, she wrote to Garweg in Celle the day before the crime that she would have liked to have been at the last meeting and couldn’t wait for the next day. According to the prosecution, a few hours after the attack in Wolfsburg, Garweg texted that it hadn’t gone well and that he had screwed up. The robbery failed because the driver of the cash truck was able to drive away. Upon request, the Verden public prosecutor’s office told “Spiegel” that it was considering expanding the investigation.