Dhe accused is badly off. Two judicial officers help Elisabeth R. into the hall of the Koblenz Higher Regional Court. The petite woman, 75, wears handcuffs and complains that she is nauseous. A little later, while the indictment was being read, she put her head under the table over a garbage can. According to the federal prosecutor, R., who taught religion in Mainz for decades, is responsible for the theory to which the other four accused referred and which is said to have guided their actions.
R. has been publishing articles for several years in which she questions the legitimacy of the Federal Republic and calls for the reinstatement of the German Reich from 1871. That alone cost the pensioner R. her pension in the past, against which she also took legal action and initially failed.
She is now in court as the suspected ringleader of a terrorist group. Also in the dock are four men between the ages of 44 and 56 who belonged to a chat group called United Patriots. The group became known under this name after its arrest a good year ago, in April 2022. According to investigators, the four men are said to have become radicalized during the protests against the corona measures in the pandemic. One of them made contact with R., who had been active in the so-called Reich citizen milieu for a long time and maintained contacts. From then on she is said to have been included in the planning and meetings.
accepted the death of people
The aim of the group is said to have been to eliminate the free-democratic basic order and to set up an “authoritarian government based on the model of the German Empire,” according to federal prosecutor Nikolaus Forschner, who read out the indictment on Wednesday morning. They are said to have pursued a multi-stage plan: attacks were intended to permanently damage substations and lines in order to cause a week-long power outage in Germany.
According to the indictment, the group is also said to have planned the removal of the federal government. An actor, disguised as the Federal Chancellor or Federal President, was supposed to explain on television that the German Reich of 1871 was being restored and that the federal government had therefore been deposed. In addition, according to the Federal Prosecutor’s Office, the Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) was kidnapped from a talk show in front of the cameras.
300,000 euros for weapons
Both in the case of Lauterbach’s bodyguards and the power failure, the group would have suffered considerable damage, but above all the death of people, according to the indictment. With the planned acts, the accused wanted to intimidate the population and cause considerable damage to the state. The accused, some of whom come from the Bundeswehr themselves, are said to have announced their intention to recruit members of the special forces command. Overall, the sentence is ten years, but it could go longer if the sentences are added up.
