More than seven years after an alleged right-wing extremist attack on a fun fair in Ballstädt, Thuringia (Gotha district), the Erfurt Regional Court imposed suspended sentences on the perpetrators on Monday. Seven defendants received one year prison sentences and two other defendants received one year and ten months' sentences - all suspended. At the suggestion of the public prosecutor's office, the verdict was preceded by agreements with the defendants, who in return for their confessions had been promised suspended sentences by the court.
A group of 16 masked people attacked the fair in Ballstädt early in the morning of February 9, 2014, injuring 20 people, some seriously. This was preceded by the throwing of a window in the so-called Yellow House, a well-known neo-Nazi property in the village. Although all nine convicts belonged to the right-wing extremist scene at least at the time of the crime, the court ruled out a political background and assessed the attack as an act of revenge.
The court had to decide on the act for the second time. The Federal Court of Justice overturned the first rulings from May 2017 in January 2020 and ordered the trial to be restarted. The main defendants were sentenced to three years and six months in prison in the first trial. The second process was determined by disputes with the accessory prosecution. The victim's lawyers filed bias requests and waived closing statements. In a statement they called the process a "farce".