A suspect who has been acquitted cannot be retried for the same crime based just off new evidence, the German Constitutional court has ruled, striking down a judicial reform.
The reform of the Code of Criminal Procedure, which came into force at the end of 2021, was unconstitutional and null and void, Germany's highest court ruled in Karlsruhe on Tuesday.
The complaint was filed by a man who was tried and acquitted of killing a schoolgirl in the state of Lower Saxony in 1981 and was charged again on the basis of new evidence. The retrial had to be terminated, said presiding judge Doris König.
The highly controversial reform made it possible to retry suspects on the basis of new evidence. The lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, passed the amendment to the Code of Criminal Procedure during Angela Merkel's chancellorship.
Before that, it was only possible in a few circumstances to reopen a legally concluded trial to the disadvantage of the accused, for example in the case of a confession.
Since the reform to the law, this has also been possible if "new facts or evidence" come to light. The rule was limited to the most serious crimes, such as murder, genocide and war crimes, which are not subject to a statute of limitations.
Judge König explained during the pronouncement of the judgement that the Basic Law, as Germany's constitution is known, contains in Article 103 not only a mere prohibition of multiple punishments, but also a prohibition of multiple prosecutions.
"This protects not only persons who have already been convicted once, but also persons who have been acquitted from renewed criminal proceedings," she said.
This applies to prosecution authorities and courts, but also to the legislature. The legislature has no leeway in revising the grounds for retrial to the detriment of the person concerned, even if it turns out in retrospect that a judgement was incorrect, she said.
A person concerned "should and must be able to trust that he or she cannot be tried again for the same offence after the conclusion of criminal proceedings that have been conducted in accordance with the rules," said the judge, who is vice-president of the Constitutional Court.
- Germany
- Retrials
Source: www.dailyfinland.fi
