Wiener Neustädter animal welfare process

Demonstration in front of the responsible regional court in Wiener Neustadt (2010)

The Wiener Neustadt Animal Welfare Trial or Animal Welfare Causa is a criminal case against several animal welfare activists held from March 2010 to May 2011 before the Regional Court of Wiener Neustadt . The charge was based on the allegation that the animal rights activists had formed a criminal organization under Section 278a of the Austrian Criminal Code , which was responsible for more than 200 crimes over a period of twelve years. The investigations since 2007, the arrests in 2008 and the conduct of the proceedings caused protests throughout Austria. In addition, in the course of the proceedings, fundamental criticism of Section 278a StGB was voiced. On May 2, 2011, the defendants were acquitted in the first instance on all charges, including the formation of a criminal organization. Despite the partial appeal of the Wiener Neustadt public prosecutor's office against this judgment, the last remaining partial indictment on May 27, 2014, confirmed the acquittal on all points. One consequence of the procedure was a reform of Section 278a of the Criminal Code.

Preliminary investigation

prehistory

The background to the proceedings is an anti-fur campaign by the Verein gegen Tierfabriken (VGT), the aim of which was the Austrian clothing chain Kleid Bauer . The strategy of the animal rights activists consisted in particular of regular demonstrations in front of the company's branches. On November 17, 2006, the first meeting of the Kleid-Bauer manager Peter Graf took place with officials of the Federal Police Directorate Vienna , the subject of which was possible actions against certain behavior of the demonstrators, including "harassment of customers". The Vienna State Police Command was instructed to document such incidents and to intervene if necessary.

On December 1, 2006 at 2:30 in the morning, property damage occurred for the first time, in which two masked men smashed almost all the shop windows of a Kleid-Bauer branch in Vienna and labeled the main entrance of the branch with “Fur is murder”. Butyric acid was discharged into a branch in Vienna-Liesing over the Christmas holidays in 2006, and on January 10, 2007, the strongly malodorous substance was brought into a branch in Graz through the door lock . The perpetrators have not yet been identified.

Also in December of the same year registered demonstrations of the grassroots group animal rights (BAT) were broken up. The official justifications stated that the events represented a “threat to public safety”. After a complaint, demonstrations took place again shortly afterwards.

Establishment of a special commission

On the night of April 3 to 4, 2007, paint was poured over two cars belonging to the von Kleid Bauer family and the tires were punctured.

“Werner and Peter Graf are managing directors at Kleid Bauer and Hämmerle and are solely responsible for business policy and fur sales. Stop selling fur, otherwise further actions will follow. The fur industry put their bloody handicrafts until all the cages are empty. ALF "

- Letter of confessors :

The next day, managing director Peter Graf contacted the Ministry of the Interior, whereupon a meeting with senior officials of the Ministry of the Interior and the Vienna Federal Police Department took place on April 5, at which the establishment of a special SoKo Clothing Commission was decided. The target of the investigation were the demonstrators of the anti-fur campaign. Internal police documents show that there was no evidence that the demonstrators were responsible. During the meeting, the police stated that “no clear connection between the demos and the damage to property has yet been established. (…) [E] in evidence or very strong indications could not yet be determined (…). ”In the summary protocol of the founding meeting, Erik Buxbaum's order to“ exhaust all administrative possibilities with regard to the prohibition of the demonstrations ”is recorded. The then police chief Peter Stiedl promised to do so with reference to previous prohibition efforts. Subsequent rallies were again prohibited. These bans only lasted for a short time. In mid-December, the Soko manager Erich Zwettler noted: “The experts for assembly law currently do not consider the prohibition of rallies to be possible”. Soko reacted to this finding by giving the demonstrations “at least two WEGA officials, preferably with a company vehicle equipped, for prevention and, if necessary, for repression ”with the intention of putting the animal rights activists“ in the public eye of 'particularly dangerous demonstrators' ””.

In addition to the vehement efforts of the Grafs to make the demonstrations in front of their shops impossible, one of the accused suspects that the Grafs also “ran into open doors” to the authorities. Defendants pointed out that the State Office for the Protection of the Constitution and Combating Terrorism (LVT) had been presenting a threat scenario from the animal rights movement at business-related events since 2006 by presenting “preventive measures”, and presented the developments in the context of international repression against the animal rights movement.

Investigations and arrests

The special commission was formed from at least 32 officers from various departments of the police as well as the protection of the constitution and the fight against terrorism and has been investigating suspects since April 10, 2007 for damage to property. In the course of the investigation there were extensive observations in the form of eavesdropping , tracking devices, online surveillance, shadowing and undercover investigations against a large number of people. Eight months after the start of the investigation, the SoKo reported to the General Director of the Police on December 18, 2007 that, apart from a DNA trace on a cobblestone, it was unable to produce any investigation results. Despite the lack of investigation results, the special commission applied for video surveillance in January 2008 and for the first time raised the suspicion that the animal rights activists had formed a criminal organization.

On May 21, 2008, nine activists and one activist from various animal rights organizations, including VGT chairman Martin Balluch and other VGT members, were arrested by the police during an Austria-wide raid and taken into custody for up to 105 days. Extensive seizures were carried out during the 23 house searches, including most of the VGT's infrastructure including donor databases, accounting and account access data. The arrest was the cause of massive criticism both inside and outside Austria, as those affected were not given access to files and for a long time it remained unclear what exactly they were being accused of.

The police could not assign any crimes to specific suspects and dropped central allegations - such as an arson attack in a hunting lodge, which had actually been an accident that had already been investigated - but kept the people in custody. The accusation against Christian Moser of hoarding explosives was also dropped, as the suspicious substance turned out to be soy milk . Martin Balluch said he received a 1,500-page excerpt from the investigation file to justify his pre-trial detention, in which his name was mentioned three times in connection with newspaper interviews or articles he had written. Several prisoners went on hunger strikes to protest the practice. The imprisonment sparked protests across Austria and internationally. After more than three months, the Vienna Public Prosecutor finally ordered the release of the animal rights activists, as the length of the pre-trial detention threatened to become disproportionate to the expected sentence.

Since 2009, a judge of the Independent Administrative Senate has also been investigating who had overturned penalties against some animal rights activists for hunting disorder and illegal parking amounting to 200 euros. When Martin Balluch praised the judge in an online forum a short time later and said that hunting disorders could now take place “with judicial protection”, the investigators had reason to believe that he had instigated the judge to abuse her office in favor of the accused animal rights activists. According to Albert Steinhauser , the judge's phone was also tapped.

Undercover investigation

In November 2010 it became known that from 2007 the police had also smuggled an undercover agent into the VGT, who was in close personal contact with several defendants during their 16-month investigation. The undercover agent under the code name Danielle Durand was denied by her superiors until her existence was proven by the accused - also in court. Reports on their activities were withheld from the procedural file. Peter Pilz , a politician from the Green Party , and the defense expressed doubts about the legitimacy of their use.

After her exposure, the undercover investigator was requested by the defense to be a witness. Protests followed Judge Arleth's announcement that this key defense witness would only be admitted in camera. Arleth finally admitted the questioning publicly, but insisted on interrogating the undercover investigator via video transmission from an adjoining room of the court into the hearing room. The judge justified this decision by stating that the investigator had to be protected from the accused. Thus, the defense could not put direct questions to their most important witness. Nevertheless, the investigator exonerated the accused with her testimony. After enjoying the defendants' trust and working closely with them for several months, she said she had never witnessed any criminal activity or planning.

Durand's task was to "avert danger according to [the] Security Police Act", and to obtain traces of DNA from the suspects. She wrote a 96-page report that was published by Peter Pilz. According to her information, she was not known to “confidant 481”.

At the end of January 2011 it became known that from April to November 2007 the police had smuggled another liaison into the animal rights group, called “Confidant 481”. This investigator, who was apparently recruited while serving a substitute custodial sentence, also found no criminal acts.

During a break in the trial on January 24, 2011, a man dressed in orange went into the room where the undercover agent Danielle Durand was staying. The lawyer Traxler advised the judge of a possible collusion, and when asked, the man in Orange stated that he was not directly involved in the investigation. The man in orange also appeared when the person of trust was interviewed.

Court decisions in the preliminary proceedings

The examining magistrate imposed pre-trial detention on the ten animal rights activists during the trial . The Higher Regional Court of Vienna rejected the appeal made by the prisoners against these decisions . On August 13, 2008, one of the detainees was released by the examining magistrate in the course of the third detention trial by revoking his pre-trial detention, as there was no longer any risk of committing a crime . The release of the remaining U-prisoners, ordered by the Vienna Public Prosecutor's Office, took place on September 2, 2008.

Seven of the ten accused filed a fundamental rights complaint with the Supreme Court against the imposition of pre-trial detention . However, the latter rejected the complaint in October 2008 and found that the pre-trial detention had not violated the constitutionally guaranteed basic right to personal freedom of the complainant.

The accused animal rights activists also lodged complaints against their arrests, house searches and their execution. The Higher Regional Court of Vienna dismissed this appeal in mid-October 2008 and found that the security authorities' approach was lawful and proportionate.

Final reports from the police

At the beginning of April 2009, the police presented the public prosecutor's office with the final report on the results of the investigation over the past few years. The final report should provide the public prosecutor Wiener Neustadt with further evidence of the planned indictment.

The VGT and the accused commented on this in April 2009 in a press conference and by mailings on their homepage and criticized the content of the final report. As happened before with parts of the investigation files and later with some criminal complaints, some of those affected published a commented version of the final reports concerning them on the Internet in order to give their criticism credibility.

In the final reports of the investigators, the VGT did not find a sufficient basis for the police and public prosecutor's office to assume that a criminal organization was responsible for the enforcement of animal rights in Austria. Her main criticisms were that the final reports did not explain why the accused should be responsible for the acts listed and why exculpatory investigation results were withheld. In a linguistic report quoted in the report, it was claimed that Chairman Balluch should have written individual letters of confession from his journalistic archive, which comprised thousands of texts. However, the validity of this report has been strongly criticized and doubted by several other linguists. Critics of the prosecution of the accused complain that the convictions expressed on the basis of private opinions could be regarded as evidence of guilt in criminal offenses and that properly reported, peaceful rallies were consistently described as militant and then added as criminal offenses to alleged perpetrators. Martin Balluch from the Verein gegen Tierfabriken criticizes the fact that constitutionally protected civil society engagement is equated with criminal offenses.

Further searches and criminal charges

On June 10, 2009, house searches were again carried out at three addresses of one of the suspects, although the animal rights activist's accommodation had already been searched in 2008. About 15 animal protection activists blocked the entrance of an apartment in Vienna-Meidling by a sit-in strike in order to point out what they considered to be unjustified persistent coercive measures until they were finally carried away by the WEGA . In the course of several renewed media reports on this case, Justice Minister Claudia Bandion-Ortner also gave an interview on ORF on June 16, 2009 in which she refused to make any substantive statements about an ongoing procedure, but confirmed that the Ministry of Justice was examining its own team whether charges should be brought against the accused animal rights activists.

In mid-August, the public prosecutor submitted a 218-page criminal complaint. Four of the ten people who were also in custody were charged exclusively under Section 278a of the Criminal Code, including the main suspect Martin Balluch . Offenses such as arson attacks or butyric acid attacks were dropped. The public prosecutor said in August 2009 that they were investigating 20 people, among other things for arson, criminal organization and serious damage to property.

According to the general report on the use of special investigative measures in 2008, 267 people were monitored in the specific case. Much of the results from these surveillance measures were not released for inspection in the court file. Albert Steinhauser , justice spokesman for the Greens , submitted an inquiry to the Federal Minister of Justice on January 28, 2010, in order to clarify fundamental questions about the legality and appropriateness of these processes.

On February 15, 2010, 220 people submitted voluntary reports to the Vienna Public Prosecutor's Office in accordance with Section 278a StGB because they were of the opinion that, given the evidence available, they too would have to be prosecuted under this law. At a VGT press conference on this occasion, it was criticized that the demarcation between legal and illegal was unclear. Political workers would no longer have legal security for their activities. By autumn 2010, a total of 300 such voluntary disclosures had been made. While most of the advertisements “only” contain the blanket allegations of the criminal complaint, two of these advertisements are written in full detail analogous to the indictment of two defendants. All voluntary disclosures have been discontinued with the reference that the activities described would not be punishable. A request to the Ministry of Justice is pending. (As of February 2011)

accusation

In the indictment, various offenses were listed which, in the opinion of the public prosecutor, could be attributed to the accused, including the formation of a criminal organization, damage to property, constant deprivation of property, unauthorized possession of a dangerous weapon, resistance to state power by bumping into a police officer, knocking on the Car window of an employee of the clothes farmer and animal cruelty as part of a pig liberation. The use of data encryption techniques at the VGT was cited as an indication of the formation of a criminal organization.

In his closing speech, the public prosecutor Wolfgang Handler expressed the view that what he believed to be the organization that existed was so well camouflaged that it would have used the structures and events of the BAT ( base group animal rights ) and the VGT ( association against animal factories ) as a basis for criminal activities can without the other members of the BAT or the VGT, the person of trust, the undercover investigator or the investigating authorities being able to notice anything.

Handler saw that the defendants' willingness to use violence in principle was confirmed by the fact that Martin Balluch wrote an email to his father in 1996 that he would have liked to put a garden hose through the window of a company manager and turn it on. Chris Moser handed out leaflets that read “kill hunters”.

process

The trial of eleven male and two female suspects began on March 2, 2010, including three defendants who had only learned 18 days before the trial that they should be charged. They complained about the short preparation time, since the main file contained around 20,000 pages, with the associated monitoring protocols around 200,000 pages. The application to postpone the trial of a defense attorney, who had received the file only a few days before the start of the trial, was rejected by Judge Sonja Arleth on the grounds that, according to the Code of Criminal Procedure, no more than two weeks of preparation time should be allowed.

All of the defendants pleaded not guilty. The arguments of their five defense lawyers mainly related to what they considered to be an inappropriate charge as a criminal organization, as they could not find essential features for this in the indictment and the prosecution did not accuse the defendants of corresponding crimes. Six of the defendants were charged solely with membership in a criminal organization. Accordingly, they were not accused of any criminal acts by the public prosecutor. Instead, he argued that knowing that they would encourage crime, they would have committed legal acts.

During the public hearing, a few incidents sparked protests from the audience. The judge then expelled the room. The media reported in particular about this process: The first defendant Martin Balluch incoherently added the phrase "Bli-bla-blu, I think the judge is not listening to me" in the middle of a sentence and continued the sentence without attracting the attention of the To obtain a judge. Judge Arleth did not allow any evidence to invalidate a linguistic opinion by a former teacher of a general secondary school, whose seriousness had been sharply criticized by several internationally recognized experts. When loud protests rang out from the audience, she expelled several rows in the audience of the hall. Since they refused to leave voluntarily and the officers present could not remove them, the judge interrupted the trial.

There was lively media interest in the process and all of Austria's major print media and TV stations sent reporters, many of whom continued to report on the latest news on the case. The first day of the trial was accompanied by a loud rally in front of the courthouse. The pieces of music, some of which were coordinated with the course of the court, could still be heard in the hearing room. The Internet edition of the Standard reported on the negotiations via live ticker.

On March 31, 2011, the last day of the trial before the expected announcement of the verdict a month later, Judge Arleth announced that she would no longer consider the court-appointed language expert, who had seriously incriminated Martin Balluch as the author of letters of confession, as he was not in the Would have been able to clear up any inconsistencies revealed in the process in his report. The public prosecutor (and again the defense) then requested the appointment of a new expert. When the judge refused, the public prosecutor declared that he was reserving the right to lodge a complaint for annulment because of this possible procedural error. On the same day, the prosecutor caused a stir by expanding the indictment again. Shortly before the closing arguments were due to begin, he brought charges of property damage, permanent deprivation of property and animal cruelty in a mink exemption from 1997, in which - according to the self-incriminating prosecution's witness - three of the accused were involved. The defendants denied these allegations and pointed to the fact that the witness had tried to harm the management of the VGT since he was voted out of office in 2002 on charges of misappropriating donations. It would also be questionable why this allegation was only made after a meeting between the witness and the public prosecutor the day before, since the witness had never mentioned this incident in his multiple statements to the police or later in court.

According to the lawyer Traxler, the total cost of the proceedings amounted to seven million euros.

Judgment of the first instance and further action by the public prosecutor's office

All of the defendants were acquitted on May 2, 2011 on all counts. The judge stated in the grounds of the verdict that neither the existence of a criminal organization could be proven, nor that there was evidence of the other criminal offenses charged. There is no evidence of any criminal interaction between VGT and BaT. Arleth attributed "substantial probative value" to the reports of the undercover agent "Danielle Durand". She pointed out that "Durands" had been deployed from January 1, 2008 without a permit and described the statements made by Soko director Erich Zwettler as a "simple protective claim". Wolfgang Schweiger's report was found to be "indeterminate and incomprehensible", the former VGT chairman Plank, who made an incriminating testimony about a mink exemption, was found to be "not credible"; For both reasons, the allegation of participation in a mink exemption against Martin Balluch and Jürgen Faulmann was dropped by the court. The allegation of an arson attack on the Knie Circus in Linz was dropped because the expert Schweiger could not prove that the letters of confession were written by Balluch. The allegation of throwing stones at a clothes farmer's branch in Gumpoldskirchen and of damaging nearby posters at a reptile fair was dropped due to the lack of evidence, Felix Hnat was acquitted in case of doubt of the allegation of resistance against state power. The accusation against Jürgen Faulmann of having carried out a pigs liberation was dropped, as reconstructions of Faulmann's movements through telephone logs suggested that Faulman did not have enough time for a liberation. Nor could it be proven that the defendants were involved in an attack on the car of a co-owner of Kleid-Bauer and that the defendant Koch made threats against the company at a shareholders' meeting of the Escada company.

The acquittals have been legally binding since June 2012 with regard to the central charge of the formation of a criminal organization . This completes the process for all those only accused under Section 278a of the Criminal Code, including the main defendant Martin Balluch. On June 29, 2012, however, the public prosecutor in Wiener Neustadt appealed the other allegations (coercion, damage to property, resistance to state violence and animal cruelty). These allegations concern five of the original 13 accused.

A few days after the public prosecutor's office announced their appeal for a review, they announced that they would indict Martin Balluch for inciting abuse of office. In 2007 he is said to have instigated a judge of the Independent Administrative Senate to repeal penal orders against several animal rights activists amounting to 200 euros each for hunting disorders. She brought a point to the indictment on which Balluch had been unsuccessfully investigated for a long time. The judge was also the target of investigations and house searches. In addition to criticizing the content of the indictment, Balluch also voiced his astonishment that this procedure was being conducted by the Wiener Neustadt public prosecutor, as none of the persons or locations concerned had a spatial connection to the judicial district of Wiener Neustadt.

Other effects of the process

Political Consequences

After the acquittals, at the instigation of the SPÖ and the Greens, the Austrian National Council decided in October 2011 to evaluate Section 278a of the Criminal Code, which was heavily criticized due to the process. In July 2012, Justice Minister Beatrix Karl announced an amendment according to which in the future a group will only be considered a criminal organization if it is “aiming for financial gain with criminal means”. In the previous version, this also applies to a group that “seeks considerable influence on politics and the economy”. The background to this is that the charges under Section 278a of the StBG in the animal rights activist trial were based essentially on campaigns against the fur trade and pig fattening, as these showed that the alleged criminal organization was striving to influence politics and the economy. According to constitutional lawyer Bernd-Christian Funk , the accused animal rights activists would have been "off the hook" after the proposed change. The change in the law was partly welcomed, but partly criticized as not being sufficiently extensive.

Other political initiatives concern in particular the amount of financial compensation for wrongly accused. This applies above all to the reimbursement of defense costs, which is currently 1,250 euros, regardless of the actual defense costs, and thus far below the approx. 400,000 euros that the accused have to bear in direct defense costs alone. The accused in the animal welfare process are therefore facing financial ruin, despite final acquittals. In May 2011, all parties represented in the Austrian National Council, with the exception of the ÖVP, spoke out in favor of an increase in compensation. Martin Balluch and the member of the National Council, Johann Meier, brought a petition to parliament in June 2012 calling for an increase in the reimbursement of costs. This is also in the context of a general criticism of the high cost of copies to be borne by the accused. Anyone who, as a defendant, needs copies of the investigation files must pay EUR 1.10 per page in Austria; If you scan the documents yourself or take photos of them, you have to pay 60 cents per page. In the case of the case file in the animal welfare process, this would amount to 220,000 euros for a complete photo. According to critics, the costs are in no way related to the actual expenditure and endanger the equality of arms between prosecution and defense and thus the right to a fair trial. In December 2011 the Austrian Constitutional Court lifted the corresponding fee regulations for copies made with devices such as digital cameras with effect from July 1, 2012, since scanning or taking photos without the aid of the court infrastructure is merely a "contemporary form of copying" has always been possible free of charge.

The Greens are also calling for the compensation for wrongly suffered pre-trial detention to be increased from currently 50 euros per day to up to 100,000 euros per month.

Legal consequences

Immediately after the end of the proceedings, various criminal charges were filed against people who were directly or indirectly involved in the indictment. Erich Zwettler, head of the special commission, and three other officials from Albert Steinhauser, justice spokesman for the Greens, were reported to the corruption public prosecutor for abuse of office , false evidence, deprivation of liberty and the suppression of documents. This was justified with the manipulation of evidence, the cover-up of exonerating investigation results, false statements regarding the use of the undercover investigator Danielle Durand in court and the continued refusal to inspect the files. The allegation of deprivation of liberty was justified by the fact that the police had deliberately misrepresented the facts in order to maintain the suspects in custody. The proceedings were closed by the Corruption Prosecutor in September 2011. Continuation requests were made by those affected . After the Independent Administrative Senate had already argued that Zwettler, as Soko leader, must have known nothing about the "Durand" mission after December 31, 2007 - after all, there are numerous cases of child sexual abuse every year without close relatives noticing anything - , the public prosecutor's office in Vienna closed the case in June 2012 on the same grounds.

Albert Steinhauser also announced a complaint against public prosecutor Wolfgang Handler in early 2011 for abuse of office, but has not yet been brought in. After the indictment against Martin Balluch for inciting abuse of office became known in July 2012, he also announced a complaint against Handler, as he had repeatedly tolerated false testimony in court to the detriment of Balluch, while "fanatically" pursuing possible false statements in favor of animal rights activists.

In addition, VGT members filed charges against the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and Combating Terrorism (BVT) for defamation, defamation and abuse of office. The background to this is that, despite the acquittals, the BVT's reports on the protection of the constitution continue to speak of “militant animal rights groups” who are accused of the “double strategy” of legal and illegal actions known from the indictment. In the opinion of those affected, it is clear from the reports that this refers to the VGT; the allegations that would have turned out to be baseless in the process, would simply be raised here. An analogue advertisement was made based on the report for the protection of the constitution published in 2012.

Martin Balluch filed a criminal complaint against Wolfgang Schweiger for false evidence based on his heavily criticized language report. The Vienna Public Prosecutor's Office announced in January 2012 that the proceedings had been terminated, as it had not been proven that Schweiger had knowingly prepared a false report. Balluch then filed a civil action against Schweiger for damages in the amount of 35,000 euros; Balluch and Schweiger reached an out-of-court settlement in October 2012 on payment of the full amount, Balluch withdrew the lawsuit.

In addition, a complaint from Balluch's defense attorney Stefan Traxler has been pending with the Independent Administrative Senate since November 2010 regarding the illegal use of undercover investigator Danielle Durand according to the defense, although the Senate has to decide on such complaints within six months.

In July 2011, it became known that, at the suggestion of former Soko officer Bettina Bogner, an investigation had been started against blogger Jörg Wipplinger for influencing criminal proceedings and defamation. Wipplinger published an interview with Stefan Traxler on his video blog in May 2010, in which Traxler had made serious allegations against the police and the public prosecutor. Among other things, it was about the suppression of evidence. Since Traxler also alleged in the interview that Kleid Bauer had exaggerated the financial consequences of a butyric acid attack, Wipplinger was threatened with a lawsuit shortly afterwards and, given the estimated amount in dispute of 50,000 euros, declared that he would delete the interview and make a payment Amount of 5,000 euros ready. Wipplinger described the allegations as "bizarre" because he hadn't said anything himself during the interview and, due to the threat of legal action from Kleid Bauer, the video was only briefly online, which means that only a few hundred people should have seen it.

An uninvolved public prosecutor from the Wiener Neustadt public prosecutor's office was filmed by an ORF camera on the day the judgment was announced , as he indicated a shot with his hands at the crowd celebrating in front of the court from a window of the courthouse. After the recordings became public in August 2012, he had to give up his position as deputy media spokesman for the public prosecutor's office. The criminal proceedings for dangerous threats have been discontinued, but the public prosecutor must answer under disciplinary law.

Personal consequences for those involved

Most of the accused suffered personal and financial consequences from job loss, loss of earnings or delays in obtaining their education. The media coverage especially highlighted Chris Moser, who had to travel 700 km from Tyrol to Wiener Neustadt to the trial every week and therefore lost his job as a restorer. Since he had to appear regularly in court, the employment office did not consider him to be looking for a job and received no unemployment benefit. His wife quit her job to look after his three children. During the process, the family lived on donations that were collected, among other things, through a support group on Facebook. Other defendants also relied on private donations and support through charity events. The physicist Elmar Völkl and the economist Felix Hnat had to interrupt their work on their dissertations, the latter had to move back in with his parents at the age of 28 and received no unemployment benefit. Since the public prosecutor's office appealed against Hnat's acquittal and continues to accuse him of attempting severe coercion for participating in anti-fur demonstrations, Hnat reported in October 2012 that he was still living on welfare and could not find a job because he was still outstanding According to the procedure, no employer could promise to come to work regularly. The defendant Sabine Koch's unemployment benefit was also canceled because she was unable to attend a further training course due to the trial. Martin Balluch presented the psychological stress and his personal financial ruin in a book published after the end of the trial.

The direct defense costs for the accused amount to 5.2 million euros, an average of 400,000 euros per person. These costs are to be borne by the accused even after the final acquittals. The reason is that in Austria there is a flat-rate reimbursement of costs of 1,250 euros for procedural costs, whereby the amount of defense costs is not relevant. In addition, there is 25 euros in compensation per day of unjustified pre-trial detention. In total, the acquitted are therefore entitled to a maximum payment of 11,650 euros.

As early as May 2011, the acquitted announced that they would sue the Republic of Austria for significantly higher compensation. In October 2012, the lawyers of the eight animal rights activists who had been acquitted on all points asked the financial procuratorate to pay each person affected 100,000 euros for the wrongly suffered pre-trial detention, for loss of earnings and compensation for pain and suffering. The five other defendants could not agree to the demand because the public prosecutor's office appealed against the acquittal on some points.

After the acquittals in November 2011, public prosecutor Wolfgang Handler was promoted to first public prosecutor in Wiener Neustadt, and is now senior public prosecutor at the public prosecutor's office for business and corruption. Erich Zwettler, formerly head of the investigative special commission, had previously been promoted to head of the Vienna State Office for the Protection of the Constitution and Combating Terrorism. Judge Sonja Arleth, on the other hand, moved to the detention judge department in January 2012. Since then, she has not led the main negotiations, but only decides whether to keep pre-trial detention and extraditions. The decision was not reasoned or commented on by the court. On the part of the SPÖ and commentators from national media, political motives were suspected for Arleth's transfer, since the central figures of the prosecution were promoted, while the judge, who acquitted the animal rights activists, was being “transferred to punishment”. However, this is opposed by an interview in the Standard, in which the new Supreme Court President Eckart Ratz, among other things, holds out the prospect of possible steps against "judges who attract negative attention" and cites the animal welfare process as an example.

The animal protection association Animal Spirit was excluded from the umbrella association of Upper Austrian animal protection organizations as a result of the process. Franz-Joseph Plank, founder and chairman of Animal Spirit, had seriously incriminated Martin Balluch with proven false statements in the process. Martin Balluch attributes Plank's behavior to the fact that Plank himself was chairman of the VGT until 2002, but was then dismissed for embezzling club funds and now harbors a grudge against the VGT and its successor Balluch.

Scientific processing

A multi-year interdisciplinary research project with the participation of lawyers and philosophers at the University of Vienna has been working on the legal processing of the process since 2011. The main question is whether Section 278a of the Criminal Code systematically makes civil society engagement more difficult. Similar regulations in other countries are also the subject of research.

Cinematic processing

In 2011 the Austrian film director Gerald Igor Hauzenberger worked on the process in a documentary . At the Viennale 2011, the film received the Vienna Film Prize for the best documentary film and the Erste Bank MehrWERT Film Prize. In addition, the documentary was awarded the Golden Eye in Switzerland in 2012. The film has also been available on DVD in stores since April 2013.

Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution

As part of the parliamentary committee of inquiry into the BVT affair , Martin Balluch, Chris Moser and the lawyer in the animal welfare process, Stefan Traxler, were questioned as information persons on March 7, 2019. VGT chairman and former main defendant Martin Balluch announced via APA-OTS broadcast that he hoped for late justice: that the backers of this political process would be exposed .

criticism

• Photos of protests about the cause
• 

  A rally against the feared threat to civil society engagement from § 278a StGB. (Source: Association against animal factories)

• 

  Activists organize a symbolic funeral of the Austrian constitution and complain about violated fundamental rights through the application of § 278a StGB against NGOs . (Source: Association against animal factories)

Political importance

Critics accused the investigative authorities of applying a law to prosecute organized crime against system-critical civil society activities in the case of the animal welfare cause. Legal involvement in non-governmental organizations is seen as a suspicion of existence and membership in a criminal organization.

The criminal offense of the criminal organization according to § 278a StGB does not presuppose a committed or attempted criminal act, since it is a preparatory offense (see preparatory act ). Even membership in a criminal organization is a criminal offense. If the courts see this suspicion confirmed, they can impose surveillance measures on large numbers of people and put the accused in pre- trial detention without suspecting any individual of specific acts . Critics see this as a contradiction to the presumption of innocence , as it makes deprivation of liberty possible without concrete suspicion.

The accused animal rights activists and critics of the investigation accuse the investigative authorities of taking serious criminal prosecution measures against citizens if their convictions correspond to alleged motives for the crime. Because criminal prosecution measures are made dependent on opinions, this practice undermines civil liberties and human rights guaranteed in the Austrian constitution . The undifferentiated use of the term “ militant ” in official statements by the authorities such as the state security reports of the police, even for peaceful demonstrations, shows a fundamental criminalization of the animal rights movement. In this context, Martin Balluch spoke of conviction criminal law .

Although, according to the public prosecutor, the NGOs concerned were not accused of criminal acts and should not be hindered in their work, the VGT's sponsor databases, accounting data and account access were confiscated. The VGT complained that it was largely unable to act as a result and accused the authorities of intending to do just that. While most of the data was only made available to the VGT after ten months, VGT chairman Balluch stated that the special commission had missed a backup of the member database, which saved the VGT from complete collapse.

The Austrian news magazine NEWS quoted an internal e-mail from Interior Ministry official Erich Zwettler, which was sent shortly after the decision to set up the special commission in April 2007. Accordingly, the Ministry of the Interior had no evidence that the damage to property was related to the activists of the anti-animal factory association. Therefore, work has to be done in a “structured” and “targeted” manner. For critics, this supports the thesis that the prosecution of the animal rights activists was not criminally but politically motivated and that the authorities tried specifically to construct criminal offenses in order to harm the animal welfare movement.

This also applies to the fact that the Vienna State Office for the Protection of the Constitution and Combating Terrorism has offered Kleid Bauer support with media work. When Peter Graf reported the damage to the two private vehicles that led to the establishment of the SOKO, a head of department suggested that the damaged vehicles be displayed in the vicinity of the Ministry of the Interior or the Chancellery. In addition, the special commission tried to have the association against animal factories denied its non-profit status, which would have resulted in its financial ruin. According to Albert Steinhauser, judicial spokesman for the Green parliamentary group in the Austrian National Council, this showed that the police had "long since had a political dispute with the association against animal factories for Kleid Bauer", since the question of public benefit had nothing to do with criminal investigations The protection of the constitution had left his area of ​​responsibility with the development of a media strategy for clothes Bauer. Steinhauser also criticized the fact that the SOKO management had proposed that for every registered demonstration by animal rights activists throughout Germany, an official from the constitution protection and at least two WEGA officials should be assigned in order to present the animal rights activists in public as "exceptionally dangerous demonstrators" .

Jurisdiction of the court

The jurisdiction of the Regional Court of Wiener Neustadt came about through a procedural error, which the then Justice Minister Berger also admitted: The first name in the file was the Green Council, Matthis Podgorski, who lived in the jurisdiction of the Regional Court, and was thus determined against "Podgorski and others". However, according to a statement from his regional association, Podgorski had no points of contact with the Austrian animal protection movement.

While the other accused were already in custody, Podgorski told the press in May 2008 that he had not even been questioned by the police. Unlike the other accused, Podgorski was not informed of the investigation against him either. His name was removed from the file after the matter became public.

The Greens suspected that this procedural error had been committed intentionally, since the Regional Court of Wiener Neustadt is known to be a particularly strict court, where it is comparatively easy to obtain measures such as surveillance and pre-trial detention. However, since the offenses in question were committed in Vienna, i.e. outside the jurisdiction of the Regional Court of Wiener Neustadt, this procedure is a "vehicle to pull the persecution of animal rights activists into the jurisdiction of the State Court of Wr.Neustadt".

Disputed amount of damage

In January 2007 a butyric acid attack was carried out in a Kleid-Bauer branch in Graz . The company reported a loss of 479,000 euros to Allianz Elementar . This described the amount of damage as excessive and rejected an insurance claim in this amount. Kleid Bauer then sued his insurance company. An animal rights activist who was suspected by the investigative authorities of having committed this damage to property joined the legal dispute as a secondary intervener on the insurance side.

The animal rights activists argued that comparable cases of damage would have resulted in a loss of no more than 20,000 euros. From their point of view, the investigations into suspected membership in a criminal organization according to Section 278a of the Criminal Code and, subsequently, the tough action of the authorities were only legally possible due to the large extent of the stated amount of damage. The high amount of damage was mentioned as an argument, among other things, in the justification for requesting surveillance of the supposedly “central figures” of the case.

In addition, an expert who was interrogated as a prosecution witness in May 2010 testified in court that butyric acid stench was not permanent and was easy to remove. Another witness, herself a victim of a butyric acid attack, initially stated damage of 100,000 euros, but then admitted that the goods could be completely cleared of the stench and sold. Werner Graf, owner of Kleid Bauer, also testified in the process that the high damage was not caused by the butyric acid itself, but by the storage of the furs during the insurance dispute. The high damage only occurred because it had become unfashionable and therefore unsaleable over time. Furthermore, Kleid Bauer initially sued his insurance company for an amount that was 100,000 euros below the stated amount of damage. The final settlement then amounted to 257,000 euros, with Graf explaining in court that this amount not only included the butyric acid attack in Graz, but all outstanding damage and other disputes with the insurance company. Since it was a general comparison, it is not possible to determine what part of the butyric acid attack is responsible. The comparison covered at least five other cases of damage not related to animal welfare, including a flooding of the Kleid-Bauer branch in Innsbruck. Also included were claims by the Hämmerle chain, which is part of Kleid Bauer. A butyric acid attack had previously caused damage of 16,000 euros.

The amount of damage was the subject of further legal disputes. Kleid Bauer took legal action against anyone who described the originally stated amount of damage as excessive. This concerned the main defendant Martin Balluch and his lawyer Stefan Traxler as well as an Austrian blogger who published an interview with Traxler on his website without commenting on the question of the amount of the damage. Due to the five-digit value in dispute, all defendants signed corresponding declarations of commitment or revocations without any legal clarification. Stefan Traxler literally spoke of a "strategy of intimidation". Critics pointed out that Werner Graf had admitted during his interrogation in court that he had reported vandalism damage reported to the police as burglary to the insurance company, and that he was aware that the deductible in the case of burglary was 10,900 euros less than for Vandalism. Kleid Bauer has meanwhile been charged with insurance fraud.

Criticism of the investigative authorities

Doubts about the legality of the preliminary investigation were expressed from different quarters. In July 2008, the security spokesman for the Greens, Peter Pilz , quoted in detail from the investigation files and compared the reasons given by the investigating authorities for the extensive surveillance measures with the legal requirements for such measures. Pilz came to the conclusion that almost all measures had been carried out without a sufficient legal basis and spoke of systematic illegal surveillance. According to him, an urgent suspicion against the accused, which is absolutely necessary for most measures, was not only not proven, but not even alleged, on the part of the public prosecutor's office.

While the suspects were in custody, the VGT criticized the special commission's refusal to allow access to the files. In February 2009, the court was ordered to grant the accused full access to the files. Since she did not comply, the Regional Court of Wiener Neustadt found in October 2010 that the conduct of the investigative authorities constituted a violation of the rights of the accused. However, the ruling did not result in the accused being given access to the investigation files, as the special commission had already been dissolved at this point in time and, according to the authorities, all findings that were considered relevant had been included in the court file.

The accused contradicted this account and pointed out that the results of numerous investigative measures were not included in the court file. The suspicion that the investigating authorities had deliberately concealed exonerating investigation results were confirmed by the unmasking of the undercover investigator "Danielle Durand", since her exonerating investigation reports had been withheld from the court.

"Danielle Durand" was smuggled into the VGT as an undercover agent. Due to a reform of the Austrian Code of Criminal Procedure, their use became subject to approval on January 1, 2008. However, an application for such a permit was never made. Soko leader Erich Zwettler testified in court during the trial that the investigator's assignment had ended before this deadline. In fact, the policewoman was still active into the second half of 2008. Stefan Wappel, the undercover agent's superior, testified that the operation had only taken place to avert danger and was therefore not subject to approval. This contradicts internal police protocols, in which it was expressly stated that a further covert investigation would require approval from 2008 onwards. At a press conference on November 24, 2010, Peter Pilz suspected that the undercover agent's mission had been kept secret because those responsible in the special commission had known that her mission was illegal. He said that the undercover agent had been proven to have urged VGT members into clandestine behavior, in which the police themselves tried to implement one of the central characteristics of a criminal organization - isolation from the outside world. Pilz announced a parliamentary question as to whether there had been any further illegal covert investigations in Austria after January 1, 2008. The constitutional lawyer Heinz Mayer described the concealment of the operation as “untenable” and spoke of a possible suppression of evidence. The criminal charges in this connection that followed the trial were discontinued.

There was also criticism of the quality of the work of the investigative authorities, which, among other things, were unable to install a functioning wiretapping system in a defendant's apartment for over a week, or the fact that a defendant had to post the post while an acquaintance was on vacation picked up at his apartment in Liechtensteinstrasse in Vienna, constructed the accusation of looking after a “dead letterbox company” in Liechtenstein.

Criticism of the litigation

Judge Sonja Arleth was repeatedly criticized by lawyers, the media and those involved in the litigation for her litigation. In particular, she was accused of obstructing witness interviews by the defense. She reworded questions to the disadvantage of the accused, influenced witnesses with leading questions and did not even allow numerous questions from the defense. Decisions on applications by the defense were also largely postponed for an indefinite period and exculpatory evidence was not admitted. The court and public prosecutor's office were also accused of deliberately dragging out the process by asking multiple irrelevant questions and calling out witnesses, which was also criticized with regard to the personal, professional and financial consequences for the accused. At the beginning of February 2011, Judge Arleth rejected a petition for bias directed against her and based, among other things, on these criticisms. Observers also criticized the judge's frequent, often unprovoked admonitions by the judge, as well as her habit of demanding punctuality from the accused and often being late even after breaks.

Well-known Austrian lawyers also criticized the litigation. The head of the Institute for Criminal Law at the University of Linz, Petra Velten , described the process after a personal visit as "inquisitorial" and incompatible with human rights and the code of criminal procedure. In a specialist article, she accused the responsible judge of inadmissible leading questions when questioning witnesses, "prior censorship" of defense lawyers' questions, frequent interruptions in questioning and unauthorized "smoothing out" of contradictions in witness statements, as well as a "solidarity" between the judge and the public prosecutor. The aim is to "neutralize" the defense. The Viennese constitutional lawyer Bernd-Christian Funk spoke of the fact that the judge's interventions “go to the limit of obstructing the free right to ask questions”.

Due to the sharp criticism of Velten in the media, the Austrian judges' association asked the Klagenfurt public prosecutor to examine legal action against Velten. The vice-president of the judges' association, Manfred Herrnhofer , commented, "[Velten must] as a scientist [...] be aware of the effects of such statements" - they damage the credibility of the judiciary. This approach was unanimously condemned by Austrian lawyers and the media, as it violates the fundamental right to freedom of expression and the freedom of science. Herrnhofer's statement also caused displeasure: “We are not in Turkey, we are not in Sudan, we are in Austria. Negotiations are in accordance with human rights, ”which also drew criticism from Turkish human rights activists. The public prosecutor's office in Klagenfurt announced after a few days that they saw no reasons for initiating investigative proceedings. Then there was a mediation meeting between Velten and the chairman of the judges' association with Federal President Heinz Fischer .

The media and defense repeatedly criticized the fact that police school classes were regularly in the audience and that it was therefore no longer possible for many interested relatives and media representatives to get into the courtroom. The court administration was accused of reserving seats for these classes. This denied the charge. On the day of the interrogation of an undercover agent, for example, according to eyewitnesses, over 40 of the 60 places were given to such students. SPÖ judiciary spokesman Johannes Jarolim called on Justice Minister Claudia Bandion-Ortner in an Ö1 interview to instruct the public prosecutor to withdraw the complaint and asked Interior Minister Maria Fekter to explain why police students regularly filled the spectator seats in the process. The Secretary General of Amnesty International , Heinz Patzelt , saw the human right to a fair trial at risk. In February 2011 the trial visits by the police students ended.

Criticism of the linguistic reviewer

The Graz high school teacher and classical philologist Wolfgang Schweiger was commissioned with the preparation of a linguistic report on the authorship of several letters of confession, postings in forums and letters to the editor. Schweiger developed his own method, which, among other things, determines the average number of letters in words, looks at the formation of sentences and, in comparison with other texts, could determine a common authorship through a correspondence of the result numbers, which Schweiger called Ultimate Power . Schweiger came to the conclusion that Martin Balluch used particularly long nouns with up to 28 letters and short, flat sentences, and that a rich vocabulary was typical for Balluch. Deviating characteristics are the result of different writing styles, which are caused by the seasons or the mood of the author. Schweiger described fluctuations in the result values ​​by 50 percent as “minimal fluctuation”. Schweiger copied the texts by hand from various sources prior to his analysis, making 178 mistakes, some of which he assessed as an indication of Balluch's guilt. Schweiger's methods were criticized by the German criminologist Reinhold Drommel, the Innsbruck linguist Manfred Kienpointer, as well as the Association for Applied Linguistics and others. Two witnesses confirmed that they had written two texts assigned by Schweiger Martin Balluch. Schweiger received a fee of € 50,000 for his report.

In the verdict, the judge stated that Schweiger's reports were “indeterminate and incomprehensible”, that his method was not taken into account because it “has not found its way into science”, that he himself could not and could not explain the values ​​conclusively in his analysis knew which texts came from the defendant and which did not.

Public criticism

The arrest of the activists led to numerous protests and criticisms. The Austrian Animal Welfare Association (VÖT) protested against the arrests in a press release.

On the political side there was criticism from the Greens , SPÖ and KPÖ . The then incumbent animal welfare spokeswoman for the Greens, Brigid Weinzinger , demanded in 2008 the immediate release of all persons and a public declaration by the Minister of the Interior and the Minister of Justice to justify the authorities' approach. According to the judicial spokesman for the SPÖ, Johannes Jarolim , “both carrying out the house search and imposing pre-trial detention work like an attempt to make an example [...] that there is a risk of obscuration, he cannot imagine, because yes all apartments have been searched and almost all possible data carriers have been confiscated, and the fact that after such a massive police action those affected could commit criminally relevant acts is more likely to be confused. ”Politicians from several parties described the events as a judicial scandal. Albert Steinhauser , Justice Spokesman for the Greens in the Austrian Parliament, expressed himself critical of the case in January 2011 and announced charges against investigators and prosecutor Handler for abuse of office. He also called for a parliamentary committee of inquiry. According to the magazine NEWS , "well-known members of the governing parties" who are not mentioned in detail are also of the opinion that the process will only be "whipped through" to justify the investigation costs of several million euros.

In the context of a panel discussion The criminal complaint in the case § 278a with renowned legal scholars on September 23, 2009, Johannes Jarolim emphasized that it was not in the interests of the legislature to use § 278a in this case, because on the one hand the socially recognized motive of animal welfare and also the severity the allegations do not meet the requirements for the application of this Act. Petra Velten , head of the Institute for Criminal Law at the University of Linz, spoke of conviction criminal law and explained why § 278a in the current interpretation of the public prosecutor's office could not only be used against any NGOs, but also against football fan clubs: as soon as it was suspected, that football hooligans have committed property damage somewhere, clubs that organize coaches to football matches could be held responsible for such property damage under Section 278a as a criminal organization - even if it were unknown who caused the damage and for what reasons. Preparatory acts for serious crime cannot be distinguished from legal activities in this way and prosecution is therefore arbitrary.

Bernd-Christian Funk from the Institute for Constitutional and Administrative Law at the University of Vienna considered §§ 278 and 278a to be unnecessary from a legal point of view and spoke out in favor of deleting them without replacement. However, due to a “repressive attitude” in large parts of Austrian society, he considers this to be currently unrealistic.

Amnesty International criticized the actions of the authorities, pointing out that they had already shown in 2002 that the legal definition of a criminal organization was inappropriately broad and excessive. The incident confirms the danger of criminalizing civil protests. According to the wording, the new catalog of offenses could also lead to the prosecution of Greenpeace as a criminal organization if, for example, activists occupied a nuclear power plant. In that case, even donors would be guilty of terrorist financing.

The Austrian Nobel Prize winner for literature, Elfriede Jelinek, condemned the police's actions in a greeting message to the imprisoned animal rights activists: "Such martial armed operations are a blow against all types of civil rights movements and must be sharply rejected." In addition, the pioneer of the animal rights movement Peter Singer and the philosopher Peter protested Sloterdijk and Peter Weibel against the action of the authorities.

The process was also increasingly criticized by commentators in the national media, including as a "grotesque show" ( Die Presse ), "judicial nightmare" ( Der Standard ), "Farce" ( Kronen Zeitung ), "almost like Kafka" ( Die Zeit ) , and "according to the logic, half the country would have to stand before the court" ( Süddeutsche Zeitung ).

Florian Klenk , deputy editor-in-chief of the weekly newspaper Falter , initially advocated the approach taken by the authorities. He wrote about the results of the searches of the defendants: "During house searches, radical leaflets were found, as well as balaclavas , spray cans, rubber gloves, site plans and the request, not to speak during interrogation and manipulate public opinion. ”In another article from March 2010, Klenk again referred to the perspective of entrepreneurs and described the announcement of legal rallies by a defendant as a dangerous threat because it was on a website with media reports linked, on which property damage was described among thousands of other reports. Klenk also quotes an email from an animal welfare forum that calls for a counterweight to isolated ALF actions through as much legal engagement as possible: “Our job seems to me to be essentially to provide cover for such actions and activists. That means that they should be able to hide safely in the crowd, their actions should be drowned out in the crowd of our peaceful actions. ”VGT chairman Martin Balluch responded to this article in his blog by questioning Klenk's impartiality and a different context the quoted mail described.

Since November 2010 at the latest, Florian Klenk has also been criticizing the approach taken by the authorities in the animal welfare process.

As a result of the process, a number of civil society organizations, including Amnesty International , Reporters Without Borders , Greenpeace and attac, joined the civil society initiative for the petition “Save Democracy!”. It warns of damage to Austrian democracy and, in particular, of the planned tightening of the criminal law paragraphs that are central to the animal welfare cause and which, in the opinion of the critics, could now also endanger journalists.

literature

• Christof Mackinger, Birgit Pack (Ed.): § 278a: We are all meant! The trial against the animal liberation movement and its background. Mandelbaum Verlag - kritik & utopie, Vienna 2011, ISBN 978-3-85476-600-1 . ( Full text of the included essay Forward- Looking Information Brokers. Europol, joint investigation teams and cross-border informers against animal rights activism. By Matthias Monroy )
• Martin Balluch: Animal rights activist. Enemy of the State - In the clutches of the police and the judiciary . Promedia, Vienna 2011, ISBN 978-3-85371-331-0
  • Resistance in Democracy - Civil Disobedience and Confrontational Campaigns. Promedia Verlag, Vienna 2009, ISBN 978-3-85371-304-4 .
• Ilija Trojanow , Juli Zeh : Attack on freedom - security mania, surveillance state and the dismantling of civil rights. Carl Hanser Verlag, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-446-23418-5 .

Film documents

• The Trial , documentary by Gerald Igor Hauzenberger , Austria 2011
• YouTube playlist with interviews with seven defendants in the animal rights trial . Some of the victims describe their situation during the trial.

Web links

Commons : Wiener Neustädter Tierschützerprozess  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Tierschutzprocess.at Blog on the course of the negotiations in Wiener Neustadt with trial reports.
• Documentation from the association against animal factories on the case.
• Antirep2008.org Website of the Antirep2008 support group with ongoing news.
• MartinBalluch.com Blog of the main defendant Martin Balluch.
• Tierrechtsprozess.noblogs.org Weblog of a defendant.
• Strafrecht-wien.com defense attorney for a defendant

Individual evidence

1. ↑ The RIS document linked here is the relevant version of Section 278a StGB at the time of the crime.
2. ↑ z. B. Initiative for a reform of § 278a ( Memento of November 28, 2010 in the Internet Archive ), Civil Society Initiative ( Memento of November 3, 2010 in the Internet Archive ), International Campaign for Human Rights in Austria
3. ↑ ^{a b} Der Standard: acquittals for all defendants , May 2, 2011
4. ↑ Der Standard : Animal Welfare Process: Demonstrations as Threat and Coercion , 7./8. July 2012
5. ↑ Der Standard : Finale in the Animal Welfare Process
6. ↑ The RIS document linked here is the reformed version of Section 278a of the Criminal Code.
7. ^ Memorandum from Hofrat Dr. Rudolf Müllebner dated November 24, 2006, on albertsteinhauser.at: press kit (PDF; 779 kB), pp. 6–8.
8. ↑ Anti-fur attack against clothes farmers , vienna.at of December 1, 2006
9. ↑ oe24.at: Butyric acid attack on clothing store , January 10, 2007
10. ↑ Documentation ( memento of October 8, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) at the base group animal rights. ( Search with the browser for December 16, 2006 )
    Press release ( memento of October 8, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 117 kB) of the group on the incidents.
11. ↑ ^{a b c} (Pack & Mackinger 2011) p. 26.
12. ↑ (Pack & Mackinger 2011) p. 28.
13. ↑ Documentation of the court hearing ( memento of the original from October 6, 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. by Peter Graf on July 29, 2010 at tierschutzprocess.at 
14. ↑ Der Standard: Kleid Bauer asked for a Soko and received one on January 5th, 2011
15. ^ E-mail from SOKO director Erich Zwettler, quoted in NEWS 36/2008, p. 34.
16. ↑ Resume protocol (PDF; 427 kB) of the meeting on April 5, 2007, on peterpilz.at
17. ↑ Ibid. 2
18. ↑ Interim report (PDF; 446 kB) from AG-Kleid December 18, 2007 at peterpilz.at
19. ↑ (Pack & Mackinger 2011) p. 27. Refers to: "Statement by the operational Soko management from January 23, 2008"
20. ↑ (Pack & Mackinger 2011) p. 35 ff.
21. ↑ gruene.at, Peter Pilz (Security Spokesman): Systematic illegal surveillance of animal rights activists ( memento from January 20, 2012 in the Internet Archive ), July 14, 2008, with a list of the surveillance measures and the reasons for the application
22. ↑ Rejection of the fundamental rights complaint by the OGH From the legal information system of the Federal Chancellery
23. ↑ Die Presse : Raid against animal rights activists . VGT chairman on hunger strike.
    • The press : arrests of animal rights activists ( memento from June 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive ). "Conspiratorial Cell Structures".
24. ^ Justice: For the accused animal rights activists, the rule of law becomes a threat to their existence , Profil, October 28, 2010
25. ↑ derStandard.at : "Human rights for monkey and animal protectionists" , September 3, 2008
26. ↑ DIE ZEIT No. 29, July 10, 2008.
27. ↑ The press : Animal rights activists released from custody: "Would that do tomorrow" ( Memento of 18 April 2017 Internet Archive September), 2, 2008
28. ^ Animal rights activists: Scandalous investigations against female judges should be cleared up ( memento from June 7, 2010 in the Internet Archive ), Albert Steinhauser on albersteinhauser.at, October 19, 2010
29. ↑ Next animal protection investigations against UVS judge , Der Standard, May 11, 2011
    • Animal rights activist: charges against the judge? , Die Presse July 20, 2012.
30. ↑ Chronology: Investigations for almost 4 years , Der Standard, February 27, 2011
31. ↑ Insider look at SOKO animal welfare agent "Danielle Durand" Vienna.at, November 29, 2010
32. ↑ ^{a b} Obscure Trial in Vienna , Süddeutsche Zeitung, March 3, 2011
33. ↑ ^{a b c} Maria Sterkl: Almost like with Kafka . In: Die Zeit, February 17, 2011
34. ^ Die Presse Tierschützer-Prozess: Judge missing "Freedom of emotions" , December 17, 2010
    • Austria (newspaper) online dispute over questioning the love agent , December 15, 2010
    • Die Presse Animal rights activist trial: scandal over "sex spy" , December 15, 2010
    • News (magazine) Scandal at the animal rights activist trial: Undercover investigator "Durand" does not testify again , December 15, 2010
    • The standard scandal in front of a statement by the police spy , December 15, 2010
    • Peter Pilz's blog Danielle Durand - reports from the undercover agent to Officer Wappel, December 2010
    • The Standard Judicial Nightmare , December 16, 2010
    • Wiener Zeitung "Durand" relieves animal rights activists , December 17, 2010 (accessed on November 22, 2013)
35. ↑ Sensitive Questions for "Danielle Durand's" Guide , Der Standard, Dec. 13, 2010
36. ↑ "Danielle Durand" questioned by the court: Further hearing in the animal welfare process , News, January 24, 2011
37. ^ The final report by Danielle Durand on peterpilz.at
38. ↑ See message at 09:44 in "Danielle Durand" did not ward off "dangerous attacks" by hunters , Der Standard, February 3, 2011
39. ↑ Second female spy exposed, daily newspaper "Österreich", February 3, 2011
40. ↑ Live report: Police include second person in animal rights activist scene, Der Standard, January 26, 2011
    • Die Presse Animal rights activist trial: Second female police spy surfaced , January 31, 2011
41. ↑ Maria Sterkl: Undercover investigator has seen nothing criminal , Der Standard, January 24, 2011. See entry at 1:30 p.m.
42. ↑ Animal rights activist investigates animal rights activists: "Not for money, but out of interest". , Der Standard, March 19, 2011
43. ↑ Die Presse : OGH throws down fundamental rights complaints from animal rights activists
44. ^ Die Presse : Tierschützer: House searches legal and proportionate
45. ↑ ORF animal rights raid: No charges yet ( Memento from July 13, 2012 in the web archive archive.today )
46. ↑ ^{a b} Association against animal factories: Animal welfare case: final police reports fully public.
47. ^ The standard on April 14, 2009: "Weibertratsch" and Tierschutzmilitanz
    • The press on April 15, 2009: Animal rights activists: Police report "not even hot air" , VGT chairman accuses the police of a lack of seriousness
    • Wiener Zeitung on April 16, 2009: "Hot air" - or is it a "criminal association"?  ( 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.  
    • Ökonews online magazine on April 16, 2009: Animal welfare - a criminal organization?
    • Online news magazine of the Austrian daily newspaper oe24.at on April 16, 2009: Scandal surrounding an investigation against animal rights activists . Austria , April 16, 2009, archived from the original on March 8, 2010 . 
    • Falter weekly newspaper on April 15, 2009: A double doctor as a double strategist?
48. ↑ ^{a b} Press release from Peter Pilz : Animal rights activists: Greens are preparing reports against investigators ( memento of May 7, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) of July 14, 2008
49. ^ Association against animal factories: The annotated criminal complaint against 2 VGT employees (PDF; 2.4 MB)
50. ^ Association against animal factories: Annotated final report by Martin Balluch (PDF; 5.1 MB)
51. ^ Kurier (print edition p. 20) of June 11, 2009: It is a question of principle
52. ↑ YouTube ORF Report of June 16, 2009: Report on the animal welfare cause (part 1) and report on the animal welfare cause (part 2) with a statement by the Minister of Justice
    • Kleine Zeitung Police broke the animal rights blockade on June 10, 2009.
    • Antirep Portal New house searches - but not without resistance! Event report with photo gallery, June 11, 2009.
53. ↑ Brickner, Irene Der Standard: This will be a monster trial , August 12, 2009
54. ↑ Steinhauser, Albert Inquiry to the Federal Minister of Justice (PDF; 40 kB) Green Parliament Club , January 28, 2010
55. ^ Causa Tierschützer: 220 self-indications in protest Die Presse (daily newspaper), February 17, 2010
56. ↑ An example (PDF; 32 kB)
57. ^ Voluntary disclosure in analogy to Chris Moser's indictment. ( Version commented by the VGT )
    • Voluntary disclosure (PDF; 259 kB) in analogy to the indictment against Elmar Völkel. ( Version annotated by the CGT ; PDF; 95 kB)
58. ^ Animal rights activists process: Ministry examines "unequal treatment " , standard January 11, 2011, 3:00 p.m.
    • Balluch's comment on the voluntary disclosures and the inquiry to the Ministry of Justice.
59. ↑ Animal welfare process: Questions and answers on the end of a monster process, Der Standard, April 5, 2011
60. ↑ See message at 20:23 in "We may hold on, in any case", Der Standard, March 27, 2011
61. ↑ ^{a b} Reviewer explains Balluch's writing style, Die Presse, March 29, 2011
62. ^ Opinion against animal rights activists: Judge sees shortcomings, Die Presse, March 31, 2011 ( Memento from July 12, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
63. ↑ A verdict on the entire NGO milieu. The Standard, April 27, 2011
64. ↑ Cf. the quotations from the closing argument from 13:01, v. a. 1:46 pm in closing arguments: "Court has a historic opportunity", Der Standard, April 1, 2011
65. ↑ See message at 1:35 p.m. in closing arguments: "Court has a historic chance", Der Standard, April 1, 2011
66. ↑ oekonews Die Tierschützer or: The End of Law and Order , December 23, 2010
    • Press review on an information page about the animal welfare cause
67. ^ Judge: "Association of judges takes legal action against criminal lawyer Velten". Retrieved June 22, 2015 . 
68. ↑ The press charges accuse animal rights activists of animal cruelty , April 1, 2011
    • The standard final exchange of blows in the animal rights process , April 1, 2011
69. ↑ Cf. quotation at 3:19 pm in: Closing arguments: "The court has a historic chance", Der Standard, April 1, 2011
70. ↑ Smooth acquittals in the animal welfare process , DiePresse.com, May 2, 2011
71. ↑ See reports at 10:45 am and 10:49 am in acquittal for all defendants on all counts - No criminal organization , Der Standard, May 2, 2011
72. ↑ See reports between 10:54 and 10:03 in acquittal for all defendants on all counts - No criminal organization , Der Standard, May 2, 2011
73. ↑ See reports at 11:11, 11:12 and 11:13 in acquittal for all defendants on all counts - No criminal organization , Der Standard, May 2, 2011
74. ↑ See notification at 11:19 am in acquittal for all defendants on all counts - No criminal organization , Der Standard, May 2, 2011
75. ↑ See reports at 10.30 am and 10:31 am in the standard live report from May 2, 2011
76. ^ ^{A b} Animal welfare process: Public prosecutor appeals , Der Standard, June 29, 2012
77. ^ Decision on the new animal welfare process, criticism of the judge, in: Der Standard, July 12, 2012
78. ↑ Animal Welfare Prosecutor Handler announces charges against me! Retrieved June 22, 2015 . 
79. ↑ The Standard Justice Minister Karl changes "excessive" anti-mafia paragraphs , July 19, 2012
80. ↑ The press New Mafia Section: Animal rights activists indicate police July 21, 2012
    • Die Presse The end of the mafia club , July 21, 2012
81. ↑ The Standard Defused Mafia Paragraph: Risk of Abuse Remains , July 20, 2012
82. ↑ Der Standard Everyone except ÖVP wants more money for legal fees after acquittal , July 29, 2011
83. ↑ ^{a b c} Die Presse Those who are acquitted should receive higher reimbursement , June 4, 2012
84. ↑ The standard copy costs "endanger fair trial" , July 29, 2011
85. ^ Judgment of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Austria, GZ. G85 / 11 and V77 / 11 of December 13, 2011.
86. ↑ The Standard Greens demand 100,000 euros in compensation per month , July 15, 2011
87. ↑ Der Standard Soko reported to the Corruption Prosecutor , May 3, 2011
88. ↑ ^{a b c} derStandard.at Animal Welfare Process: Language expert will not appear in court , January 24, 2012
89. ^ Kronen Zeitung proceedings against SOKO boss Erich Zwettler discontinued , June 5, 2012
90. ↑ How the police made animal rights activists dangerous , Die Presse of January 22, 2011.
91. ↑ Martin Balluch's blog from July 17, 2012
92. ↑ Der Standard Tierschützer: Reopening the case against SOKO officials , September 7, 2011
93. ↑ The press New Mafia Section: Animal rights activists indicate police July 21, 2012
94. ↑ derStandard.at Tierschützer-Prozess: Balluch reaches an agreement with the expert , October 12, 2012
95. ↑ derStandard.at The defendant blogger has to pay 5,000 euros , August 3, 2010
96. ↑ derStandard.at advertisement: Blogger is said to have "influenced" the animal welfare process , July 14, 2011
97. ↑ derStandard.at Public prosecutor stumbles upon animal rights activists , August 30, 2012
98. ↑ derStandard.at "Shooting gesture" after acquittal: Disciplinary proceedings against Wr. Neustadt public prosecutor , December 3, 2012
99. ↑ ^{a b} derStandard.at The money worries of the maybe criminals , March 31, 2010
    • Profile The Mafia Posse , May 8, 2011
    • ORF Tirol animal welfare process: acquittal for Chris Moser , May 2, 2011
100. ^ Solidarity for Chris Moser's family. Retrieved June 22, 2015 . 
101. ↑ Profile Justice: For the accused animal rights activists, the rule of law is a threat to their existence , October 28, 2010
102. ↑ ^{a b c} derStandard.at Animal rights activists want 800,000 euros in compensation , October 2, 2012
103. ^ Profile The Mafia Posse , May 8, 2011
104. ↑ Martin Balluch : Animal rights activists. Public enemy: In the clutches of the police and the judiciary, Vienna 2011
105. ↑ derStandard.at Balluch lawyer wants 70,000 euros per client , May 3, 2011
106. ↑ derStandard.at Animal Welfare Trial Public Prosecutor was promoted , November 22, 2011
107. ↑ Division of business and corruption prosecutor's office , June 2, 2014
108. ↑ derStandard.at animal welfare process: judgment "in absolute final phase", Arleth becomes judge , January 25, 2012
109. ^ DiePresse.com Tierschützer-Prozess: Judge "graduated" , January 26, 2012
     • derStandard.at Lessons from the animal welfare process , January 28, 2012
110. ↑ derStandard.at : New OGH President: Disciplinary notices for incompetent judges , February 8, 2012
111. ^ Animal Spirit eV: Incredible intrigues in animal welfare escalate ( memento from June 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive ), press release from September 1, 2011.
112. ↑ Martin Balluch's blog: Pseudo key witness exposed as a liar, August 5, 2010.
113. ↑ The standard animal welfare process becomes a research topic , May 13, 2011
114. ↑ orf.at V'14 Vienna Film Prize , November 2, 2011
115. ↑ Hoanzl Shop: The Process DVD ( Memento from February 3, 2017 in the Internet Archive )
116. ↑ Animal rights activists' interrogations in the BVT committee of inquiry begin on Wednesday , APA-OTS broadcast by the Verein gegen Tierfabriken on March 6, 2019.
117. ↑ New explosive documents in the BVT investigation committee on the animal welfare cause , APA-OTS broadcast of the Verein gegen Tierfabriken from March 7, 2019.
118. ↑ Austrian Autumn ( Memento from March 5, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Date magazine, October 2010
119. ↑ Parliamentary inquiry (PDF; 42 kB) from Johannes Jarolim and Dietmar Keck (both SPÖ) and comrades to the Federal Minister of Justice , citing a statement from Amnesty International Austria
     • Standard videocast on April 19, 2009 by Robert Misik (episode 73): Cage for animal rights activists?
     • Standard videocast on November 28, 2010 by Robert Misik (episode 157): The animal rights activist process must be stopped immediately
120. ↑ BMI: download page for the state security reports of recent years
121. ↑ Interview with Martin Balluch, October 30, 2008
122. ^ VGT summary: Repression methods of the authorities
123. ↑ PK statement Balluchn (PDF) , vgt.at, January 21, 2011
124. ↑ Anatomy of a Police Scandal , NEWS 36/08, pp. 32–35.
125. ↑ Authorized order of the Department for Extremism of the State Office for the Protection of the Constitution and Counter-Terrorism from April 4, 2007, documented in albertsteinhauser.at: PK-Tierschützerprozess-Pressemappe
126. ^ Memorandum from Wolfgang Müller, June 19, 2008, documented in albertsteinhauser.at: PK-Tierschützerprozess-Pressemappe , p. 14.
127. ↑ ^{a b} Material for a press conference on January 21, 2011, albertsteinhauser.at: Animal rights activist process is politically motivated ( Memento from January 24, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
128. ^ Letter from the LKA Vienna from January 23, 2008, documented in albertsteinhauser.at: PK-Tierschützerprozess-Pressemappe
129. ↑ The Standard of May 31, 2008.
     • DiePresse.com : Arrested animal rights activists: Berger admits mistakes.
130. ↑ Inconsistencies in legal proceedings. ( Memento from June 28, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) May 30, 2008 at: niederoesterreich.gruene.at
131. ^ OTS: VGT press release of October 17, 2008
     • The standard :Animal rights activists versus clothing makers: litigation continues, October 17, 2008
132. ↑ ^{a b} Press release by Brigid Weinzinger on the subject of "Repression against Animal Welfare" ( Memento from January 20, 2012 in the Internet Archive ), May 26, 2008
133. ^ New witnesses heard in the animal rights activist trial ( Memento from February 24, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Kleine Zeitung from May 17, 2008.
134. ↑ ^{a b} Trial report by the lawyer Eberhart Theuer ( Memento from January 3, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
135. ↑ ^{a b} tierschutzprozess.at: Animal Welfare Process 40th day , July 29th, 2010 ( Memento of the original from October 6th, 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. 
136. ↑ ^{a b} Der Standard : "That would have become existential" , May 19, 2010
137. ↑ Der Standard : "The sued blogger has to pay 5,000 euros" , August 3, 2010
138. ↑ SOKO animal welfare convicted for denied access to files! (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on November 29, 2010 ; accessed on June 22, 2015 . 
139. ↑ Clothes Bauer asked for a Soko and got it. Retrieved June 22, 2015 . 
140. ^ Animal rights activists trial: Undercover investigators for the Greens "illegal" ( Memento from November 29, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Green Parliament Club, November 24, 2010
141. ^ Ö1 Mittagsjournal , December 18, 2010
142. ↑ "Only noise" during eavesdropping: "That's the way technology is" , Der Standard, March 20, 2011
143. ↑ See message at 2:09 pm in "We may hold on, in any case, Der Standard, March 27, 2011
144. ↑ Animal rights activist process: The grossest undesirable developments. In: The press . January 3, 2011
145. ↑ ^{a b} ARD-Europa-Magazin: Austria: The rule of law drives animal rights activists to ruin. January 29, 2011
146. ↑ Die Presse : Animal rights activist trial: "Dozen of pointless witnesses" . February 4, 2011
147. ↑ Die Presse : Animal Welfare Process: Red Alert . December 21, 2010
148. ↑ Petra Velten: A process at the LG Wr. Neustadt. "Establishing the truth is entirely a matter for the court" or how to neutralize the defense. In: Journal for Criminal Law. 6/2010, pp. 211-216.
149. ↑ Maria Sterkl: animal rights process: charges against criminal defender Velten because "reputation of the judiciary at risk" . In: The Standard . February 7, 2011
     • "Criminal Judicial Criticism?", The Standard of February 11, 2011
     • "Bottomless loss of level", Der Standard dated February 8, 2011
     • "Justice persecutes its critics," Die Presse, February 16, 2011
     • " Dissatisfaction with the judges' association is increasing ( memento from February 17, 2011 in the Internet Archive )", Kleine Zeitung, February 15, 2011
150. ^ " Turkish activists write an open letter. ( Memento from August 24, 2011 in the Internet Archive )" shameonaustria.org, February 15, 2011.
151. ↑ Criticism of the animal welfare process: No reason for proceedings. The press, February 16, 2011
152. ↑ Shaking the foundations of the judiciary. Der Standard, February 27, 2011
153. ^ Ö1 : Jarolim: judicial scandal animal welfare process . December 17, 2010
154. ↑ 69. ( Memento of the original from February 19, 2011 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. & 70th day ( Memento of the original from February 28, 2011 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. (tierschutzprocess.at)   
     • Maria Sterkl: process Ticker , derStandard.at 16 February, 2011.
155. ^ Reviewer counted letters, Die Presse, February 28, 2011
156. ↑ See message at 9:27 am in Three defendants leave the hearing, Der Standard, February 28, 2011
157. ↑ See message at 11:39 in "Because I know how Balluch writes", Der Standard, March 28, 2011
158. ↑ See message at 9:52 p.m. in: Fear of process repetition, Der Standard, April 31, 2011
159. ^ Animal rights activists: Complaint against expert witnesses for the prosecution, Die Presse, February 22, 202011
160. ^ Association for Applied Linguistics: Open letter to Federal Minister Claudia Bandion-Ortner (PDF; 92 kB)
161. ^ Criticism of the language expert Schweiger, Der Standard, February 29, 2011
162. ^ Animal rights activists trial: judgment on May 2 , ORF Online, March 11, 2011, accessed on October 25, 2013
163. ↑ See the reports at 10:45 am, 10:58 am, 10:00 am and 10:01 am in acquittal for all defendants on all counts - No criminal organization , Der Standard, May 2, 2011
164. ^ Association against animal factories : Comments from prominent people and organizations (overview)
165. ↑ Association of Austrian Animal Welfare Organizations : Animal rights activists treated like serious criminals .
166. ^ SPÖ press service: Animal rights activists: Jarolim worries about proportionality .
167. ^ Die Presse Online Report of August 27, 2008
     • The judicial scandal involving animal protection activists continues , KPÖ short reportfrom July 27, 2008
168. ↑ "The monster trial against the 'Mafia Phantom'", NEWS 5/2011, p. 50.
169. ↑ Der Standard : Legal experts criticize Mafia paragraphs . September 23, 2009
170. ↑ The standard : "The anti-Mafia paragraph is dispensable" . October 16, 2010
171. ↑ Amnesty International: Statement on the arrest of ten animal rights activists on May 21, 2008 ( Memento of April 15, 2010 in the Internet Archive ). June 4, 2008
172. ↑ Die Zeit : Animal Welfare: Operation Fur Animal . May 28, 2008
173. ↑ ^{a b} Der Standard : Human rights for monkey and animal rights activists . September 3
174. ↑ Der Standard : Is Austrian Civil Society Asleep? September 4, 2008
175. ↑ Manfred Seeh: Missed chance in the matter of "Mafia" . In: The press . May 29, 2010
176. ↑ Irene Brickner: Judicial Nightmare . In: The Standard . December 16, 2010
177. ↑ Peter Grotter: Scandal about the witness: the animal welfare process is becoming more and more of a farce - demolition . In: Kronen Zeitung . December 15, 2010
178. ↑ Falter (weekly newspaper) : Lost a compass of values? ( Memento from September 9, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
179. ↑ Falter (weekly newspaper) : Non-human animals ( Memento from March 2, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
180. ^ Martin Balluch : Replica to Florian Klenk
181. ↑ Florian Klenk's blog: Animal protection process: The judiciary is losing sense of proportion ( Memento from December 22, 2010 in the Internet Archive ). November 24, 2010
     • ORF CLUB 2: How far can animal rights activists go? January 26, 2010
182. ↑ Petition: "Save Democracy!" ( Memento of November 3, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) of the civil society initiative
183. ↑ Information ( memento of October 19, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) about the film on AustrianFilm.at, viewed on June 10, 2013