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Pond in Neukirchen in northern Hesse
Photo: Frank Rumpenhorst/ dpa
More than seven years after the death of three children in a village pond in northern Hesse, the Frankfurt Higher Regional Court has acquitted the then mayor of the municipality. It was a terrible accident, but there was no criminal offence committed by the mayor at the time, said the presiding judge on Monday at the pronouncement of the verdict in Frankfurt am Main.
As a result, previous guilty verdicts by the Marburg Regional Court, among others, were overturned. It could not be established that necessary measures to secure the pond could have prevented the death of the children with a probability bordering on certainty, the judge said.
The three siblings, aged five, eight and nine, drowned in Neukirchen in 2016. At least one child is said to have fallen into the water while playing, the others were said to have had an accident while trying to provide help. The embankment was paved and slippery, so they couldn't save themselves.
The Marburg Regional Court had sentenced the former mayor to a fine for negligent homicide by omission, because he is said to have violated the duty to ensure traffic safety for the pond. The CDU politician had defended himself against this before the Higher Regional Court.
wit/dpa