A decision to bring charges against a deputy head of police who ordered a senior colleague to threaten to inflict pain on a suspect has triggered a debate in Germany over the use of police torture.
Most German newspapers Saturday supported the decision by prosecutors to file charges against Wolfgang Daschner, of the Frankfurt police department, who has admitted authorizing the threat to force a kidnapper to reveal the whereabouts of his victim.
Unknown to police at the time, the 11-year-old son of a prominent banker had already been killed by the kidnapper and his body dumped in a lake.
The case when it comes to court is bound to raise the question: can torture or the threat of torture be used by police as a last resort if it means saving a person's life?
Much sympathy and understanding had been expressed for the police chief, who found himself four days after the disappearance of Jakob von Metzler in September 2002 facing an uncooperative kidnap suspect.
Magnus Gaefgen, a 28-year-old law student, had already sent police on a false trail and Daschner felt time was running out.
Only after Gaefgen had been threatened and told by Daschner that a torture expert was on his way by helicopter to join the interrogation did the suspect confess the boy was dead and reveal his whereabouts.
Daschner, a 60-year-old career policeman with a reputation for correctness, even made a note in the files of his order to the chief inspector in charge of questioning to "inflict Magnus Gaefgen with pain" to try to make him reveal the truth.
He also informed prosecutors of his action, arguing that he was justified in threatening the man in the special circumstances.
Daschner received support at the time from politicians including the Hesse state premier, Roland Koch, who said he could understand why the police chief had taken the action he did in an extreme situation.
Following a year-long investigation, prosecutors say they have decided to bring charges against Daschner of "instigating an act of intimidation" rather than the more serious charge of "extortion of testimony by duress." Charges of "intimidation" and "abuse of office" have been brought against the 50-year-old police inspector.
A spokesman for the Frankfurt prosecutors office said it would be more difficult to obtain a conviction against Daschner on the more serious charge as police were not trying to force a confession but trying to save a life.
The charge was welcomed by the head of the German Police Union, Wolfgang Speck, who said the use or threat of torture must remain an absolute taboo in Germany, but that Daschner's action demonstrated the extreme situations in which police sometimes found themselves.
Dieter Wiefelspuetz, parliamentary home affairs expert for the ruling Social Democrats, said Daschner had discredited the rule of state law and should never be allowed to work in a position of similar responsibility again.
And in a country in which there are still strong memories of the use of torture by the Nazis, the Sueddeutsche Zeitung said in a commentary that Germany knew better than most that there "are things on which the essence of civilization stands or falls."
The ban on the use of torture "is a pillar of the state of law which was built here after 1945 and on which the country can be proud." It was right to file charges, and it was right the police officers would now have to answer for their actions, it said.
A date for the case has yet to be announced. Daschner's lawyer, Eckart Hild, said the charge would be contested as the police chief had acted within reasonable bounds to try to save the boy's life.
Meanwhile Hans-Ulrich Endres, the lawyer for kidnapper Gaefgen, has protested against the decision to file the milder charge and said he hoped the "true dimension" of the case would come to light in court.
Gaefgen, who had been seeking a ransom of 1 million euros (US$1.25 million) from the boy's family, was sentenced to life imprisonment in July last year, but Endres said he would be appealing to the constitutional court in Karlsruhe against the sentence in view of the police threat of torture.
"Should Karlsruhe prove me right, Magnus will be free in three years and have a claim to damages," he told Focus magazine.
Daschner has meanwhile been transferred from Frankfurt to other police duties in nearby Wiesbaden. He could face a jail sentence of between six months and five years on conviction.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not