Harry Wörz

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Harry Wörz (born May 3, 1966 in Birkenfeld ) is a German architectural draftsman . He was found guilty of attempted manslaughter of his then-wife in January 1998 . Wörz spent four and a half years in prison from the end of April 1997 until his release in November 2001. In December 2010, he was finally acquitted in a retrial . The case caused a sensation nationwide. The second prime suspect, an officer from the investigating police station, has never been sued.

biography

After attending primary and secondary school , Harry Wörz completed an apprenticeship as a gas and water plumber . He later made up his secondary school leaving certificate and retrained as a draftsman . In September 1994 he married a policewoman and in March 1995 a son was born. A year after the birth, the woman moved out of the shared apartment and began a relationship with a married colleague. Harry Wörz has been in a relationship with another woman since 2001, with whom he has a daughter.

Criminal proceedings

arrest

On April 29, 1997, Wörz was arrested in his home town of Graefenhausen . His ex-wife, who is back in her parents' house in Birkenfeld, was strangled with a scarf in the early hours of the morning . At the time, her father was sleeping in the apartment in the house and found her unconscious after two in the morning. He resuscitated her through first aid measures . Since then she has been a nursing case because of her severe brain damage caused by the lack of oxygen and cannot make any statements about the perpetrator. The investigations of the Pforzheim police initially focused on the victim's lover, also a police officer, alongside Wörz . However, he received an alibi from his wife , whereupon this investigation was not pursued any further.

Judgments

On January 16, 1998, the Karlsruhe Regional Court sentenced the defendant to 11 years in prison for attempted manslaughter. In contrast Wörz put revision , which the Federal Court dismissed in August 1998th The ruling of the Karlsruhe Regional Court was thus final.

Civil litigation

The parents of the victim sued Wörz in October 1999 at the Karlsruhe Regional Court for DM 300,000 (adjusted for inflation today approx. 205,000 euros) in compensation for pain and suffering and compensation for their daughter, who was permanently dependent on care. On April 6, 2001, the lawsuit was dismissed on the grounds that there were serious doubts about the defendant's guilt. The district court added some critical remarks to the investigations of the Pforzheim police to the detailed assessment of the evidence in its judgment.

For this civil procedure, Wörz had undergone a lie detector test on March 28, 2000 by the expert Udo Undeutsch . Its report came to the conclusion that Wörz was telling the truth. However, the test was of no significance for the judgment.

Retrial

In October 2001, Wörz applied to the Mannheim Regional Court to reopen the proceedings. This was rejected by the court. Wörz appealed against this. On November 30, 2001, the Karlsruhe Higher Regional Court ordered the case to be examined. The arrest warrant against Wörz was overturned. In March 2004, the Mannheim Regional Court rejected retrial. Wörz also appealed against this to the Karlsruhe Higher Regional Court , which ordered the reopening of the proceedings. The retrial began on May 30, 2005. After 19 days of trial, Wörz was acquitted on October 6, 2005 “for lack of evidence”.

In October 2006, the Federal Court of Justice overturned the acquittal . As a result, a retrial began on April 22, 2009 before the Mannheim Regional Court, where Wörz was acquitted on October 22, 2009. The board considered it likely that the woman's lover at the time was the perpetrator. Serious investigative errors by the police and the public prosecutor played a role in reaching the verdict, which ultimately led to the conviction in the first trial. The acquittal was initially not final, as the legal representative of the accessory prosecution and the public prosecutor appealed. On December 15, 2010, the Federal Court of Justice in Karlsruhe rejected the appeal on Harry Wörz's acquittal. Wörz is now legally acquitted. On January 14, 2013, the Karlsruhe public prosecutor closed all investigations. The authorities said there was no initial suspicion of another perpetrator.

compensation

In 2012 Harry Wörz received an advance payment of 41,900 euros (25 euros per day of imprisonment) as well as an advance payment for the material damage. In 2014, the Public Prosecutor's Office awarded him a temporary monthly payment for incapacity for work due to criminal prosecution .

On July 25, 2014 it became known that Wörz had sued the state of Baden-Württemberg for further compensation payments . Wörz claimed 86,000 euros in lost earnings and 26,000 euros in damages for the costs of his lawyers and the furniture from his apartment, which had been broken up while he was in custody.

At the end of 2016, Wörz finally reached an agreement with the state of Baden-Württemberg on compensation of 450,000 euros.

The case in the media

The proceedings against Harry Wörz met with great media coverage. Gisela Friedrichsen described the proceedings on Spiegel Online as one of the “most unusual processes in German legal history” and accompanied the case with additional reports. Even the ZDF , the SWR and numerous (also regional) newspapers reported on the trials of Wörz. Gunther Scholz made three documentaries (2001, 2006 and 2010) about the case. In July 2013, the production company teamWorx and the SWR began shooting the television film Unter Anklage: The Harry Wörz Case , which reflects the events and was shown (for the first time) on January 29, 2014 in Das Erste .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Judgment of the Mannheim Regional Court from October 2005, Ks 400 Js 37766/01 (PDF)
  2. ↑ The whole story ( Memento of the original from October 29, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (Self-presentation by harrywoerz.de)  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.harrywoerz.de
  3. ^ Judgment of the Karlsruhe Regional Court of April 6, 2001 8 O 152/99
  4. ↑ BGH 1 StR 180/06 - judgment of October 16, 2006
  5. ↑ Harry Wörz acquitted  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . Südwest Presse online from October 22, 2009@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.swp.de  
  6. ^ Acquittal for Harry Wörz homepage of the Südwestrundfunk
  7. ↑ prosecutor appeal with a www.focus.de
  8. ↑ BGH 1 StR 254/10 - judgment of December 15, 2010
  9. ↑ Harry Wörz is finally a free man in: Spiegel Online from December 15, 2010
  10. ↑ Harry Wörz is finally free in SWR.de - Nachrichten of December 15, 2010
  11. ↑ Spiegel Online from January 14, 2013
  12. ^ Victims of justice: Harry Wörz receives 41,900 euros in compensation. In: Badische Zeitung. January 19, 2012, online at Badische-Zeitung.de, accessed on January 31, 2017.
  13. ↑ Victims of justice: Harry Wörz receives compensation. In: Der Spiegel. April 17, 2014, online at Spiegel.de, accessed on January 31, 2017.
  14. ↑ Gisela Friedrichsen : Victims of justice: Harry Wörz sues for further compensation. In: Der Spiegel. July 25, 2014, online at Spiegel.de, accessed on January 31, 2017.
  15. ↑ Regional court Karlsruhe: Justice victim Harry Wörz demands higher compensation. In: Badische Zeitung. June 8, 2015, online at Badische-Zeitung.de, accessed on January 31, 2017.
  16. ↑ Comparison in Baden-Württemberg: 450,000 euros compensation for justice victim Harry Wörz. In: Legal Tribune Online on the decision of the Karlsruhe Regional Court, Az. 10 O 370/14, on LTO.de, accessed on January 31, 2017.
  17. ↑ Harry Wörz receives 450,000 euros from the country. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , January 9, 2017, accessed on February 20, 2017 .
  18. ↑ Spiegel Online (Ed.): Beloved entangled in contradictions , May 12, 2009. Retrieved May 8, 2011.
  19. ↑ Julia Jüttner: Last Chance for Harry Wörz , April 22, 2009. Accessed May 8, 2011.
  20. ↑ ZDF (Ed.): Justizdrama ended: Harry Wörz acquitted  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , December 15, 2010. Retrieved May 8, 2011.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.heute.de  
  21. ↑ SWR Online (Ed.): Harry Wörz's acquittal canceled , October 17, 2006. ( Copy on harrywoerz.de ; PDF; 79 kB)
  22. ↑ FAZ.NET (Ed.): Trial against Harry Wörz is being reopened , October 16, 2006. Accessed on May 8, 2011.
  23. ^ The First Online Program - Under Indictment: The Harry Wörz Case. Retrieved January 18, 2014 .
personal data
SURNAME Wörz, Harry
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German draftsman, suspect who has been acquitted several times
DATE OF BIRTH May 3, 1966
PLACE OF BIRTH Birch field