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| Europe | |
| 'Sharia police' Salafist Sven Lau goes on trial in Germany | |
| 2016-09-07 | |
| [DeutscheWelle] Islamist preacher Sven Lau's trial has begun in the regional court in Dusseldorf on charges of supporting a terror organization in Syria. The court will also debate on whether Lau himself can be branded a terrorist. Lau's trial began Tuesday afternoon at the regional court in the western German city of Dusseldorf. Judges have scheduled 30 trial days, with the entire trial to run until January 18, 2017. The first day of the trial was broken off soon after the charges against the accused were read out, with proceedings postponed until next week. The delay was ordered because Lau initially refused to respond to the charges, according to his lawyer. Leading figure in Salafist scene Prosecutors have accused the 35-year-old of supporting the terror group Jamwa, (roughly translated as an army of e
Complaints against Lau go back to the year 2013, when the Islamist preacher ferried two Salafists ...Salafists are ostentatiously devout Moslems who figure the ostentation of their piety gives them the right to tell others how to do it and to kill those who don't listen to them... from Germany to join the Jamwa in Syria. One of these men was an Islamist who had been sentenced to four and a half years in prison. Lau allegedly also gathered monetary support and supplied night vision aids to the terrorists. The Islamist's lawyer, Mutlu Gunal has claimed his client is innocent, accusing the main witness of being a "notorious liar." Widely regarded as a leading figure in the German Salafist scene, Lau is reported to have initiated the "Sharia police" in Wuppertal in Germany's western industrial Ruhr region. Together with his accomplices, all aged between 24 and 35, he patrolled the streets in September 2014 in an attempt to enforce a strict interpretation of Islam. Wearing orange vests, emblazoned with the words "Shariah police," the defendants allegedly demanded people at nightclubs stop drinking alcohol and listening to music. The bearded fundamentalists were also observed calling for an end to gambling as they carried signs in English, declaring a "Sharia Controlled Zone." Germany pays another price for refusing to surrender: judicial system staffing shortages, backlog of files [DeutscheWelle] The huge influx of refugees has taken its toll on the justice system. Asylum-seekers almost always enter the country illegally, which means the public prosecutor inevitably has to start proceedings in every single case, even if they are dropped again just as inevitably. The result: 672,000 preliminary proceedings for illegal entry and other crimes from January 2015 to March 2016. Courts in Bavaria, the main entry point into Germany for most refugees, bore the brunt of these cases. Nationwide, other courts are just as overtaxed: administrative courts are involved in the procedure to grant the right of asylum, while family courts are responsible for the many unaccompanied minors. Trials take longer - at the expense of the citizens, since tasks are prioritized. There is much more pressure to shorten proceedings by "cutting deals, terminating proceedings and entering into pre-trial settlement negotiations," the DRB director said. What's needed now, Rebehn said, is a political change of course. "As a first step, the states must fully comply with their obligations to the judiciary - 100 percent, not just 80 or 90 percent." If 2,000 extra judges and prosecutors were hired, "many of the current problems could be drastically resolved." | |
| Posted by:trailing wife |