Sylvia Stolz : The Reality of Freedom of Expression (English overdub) (1:33:56)

Sylvia Stolz, a criminal-defense lawyer, was a member of Ernst Zündel’s defense team during his free-speech trial in Germany in 2006/2007. Due to her confrontational defense, she was eventually banned from defending Zündel. Zündel was sentenced to serve a five-years in prison for revisionist statements he had made online and in print, even though those statements were and are perfectly legal in the US and in Canada, from where he had distributed his statements.

Following the trial, Stolz was herself put on trial for written statements she had made while defending Zündel in court. In January 2008 she was convicted and sentenced to a 3½-year prison term for defending her client.On November 2012 Stolz was a guest speaker at the Anti-Censorship Coalition’s 8th Conference held at Chur, Switzerland, to which she had been invited by Ivo Sasek, the founder of this association, to speak about her experience.

Her presentation was not about history but about freedom of speech and her inability to defend her client without herself violating Germany's anti-Holocaust-denial laws. Almost a year after her speech, in January 2013, the Swiss lawyer Daniel Kettiger filed a criminal complaint against Sylvia Stolz and Ivo Sasek for violating the Swiss anti-racism law, Section 261bis of the Swiss Penal Code. Stolz was subsequently sentenced to an additional 20 months in jail.