Important Decision by the Supreme Court of FRG
German author Michael Winkler [http://www.michaelwinkler.de/] from Würzburg in Franconia had been succesfully appealing to the Supreme court, the Constitutional Court of the FRG.
The case: Winkler had been sentenced because of "denying the holocaust" for he had written in an article that "since 1944 no Jew had been deported to Auschwitz". Before the most recent decision of the Constitutional Court it had been trials in eight courts(!) maintaining the sentence.
Ridiculous enough, especially to be subject of eight trials, the question was whether "since" (in German "seit") means that from during (including) 1944 on no Jew had been deported to Auschwitz or that with the end of/after 1944 no Jew had been deported to Auschwitz.
As a matter of fact, concerning the German language, saying "seit 1944 ist kein Jude mehr nach Auschwitz verschleppt worden" ("since 1944 no Jew had been abducted to Auschwitz") clearly means that after the year 1944 had come to an end no Jew had been deported to Auschwitz anymore. But all the state prosecutors and judges in eight trials were by purpose and consciously misunterstanding the term "seit" in the context in question in order to sentence Michael Winkler.
The Constitunional Court now determined the right of free speech was so important that in any case, if there are several possibilities to interpret a statement, the court is bound to assume the most beneficial one for the defandant.
This is a very weighty decision by the Supreme Court because in "holo-trials" the state prosecutors and judges would take the most unfavourable interpretation for the accused, keen on to sentence by all means.
Read the decision of the Constitutional Court:
The press is outrageous about:
Gerhard Ittner
Nürnberg, 23. April 2017
Bibliographic information about this document: n/a
Other contributors to this document: n/a
Editor’s comments: n/a