A few weeks ago, Pfungstadt's mayor Patrick Koch (SPD) was still beaming when he announced the motto for Hessentag 2023 in the old town hall.

After the turmoil surrounding the sale of the Pfungstädter brewery and the bankruptcy of the major “Shark City” project, he could use positive headlines.

But now the mayor of Pfungstadt may be threatened with losing the mayor's office and imprisonment.

Koch will be standing in front of the Dieburg district court next Tuesday on charges of betrayal of secrets.

The allegations against Koch do not result from his time as mayor, but from his time as chief detective in the police headquarters in South Hesse.

In this function, Koch was one of the investigators of a double murder in Babenhausen in the Darmstadt-Dieburg district, in which a couple was murdered in April 2009 and their severely disabled daughter was critically injured.

Circumstantial trial against the neighbor

A neighbor of the couple who had previously repeatedly complained about noise from the neighboring house was quickly identified as the suspect.

The then 41-year-old man was sentenced to life imprisonment in a circumstantial trial, whereby the court determined the particular gravity of the guilt, which makes an early release rather unlikely.

The convict's wife had sought a retrial in 2018 because she is convinced of her husband's innocence. This reopening application was rejected by the Kassel Regional Court, as was the complaint against it before the Frankfurt Higher Regional Court in May 2020.

In June of last year, according to the charges of the Darmstadt public prosecutor's office, Koch is said to have communicated details of the investigation to the lawyer of the convict's wife in an email. In it, Koch accuses the former Darmstadt police chief Gosbert Dölger of having committed himself to the neighbor as the perpetrator shortly after the crime and of having put pressure on the special commission. The investigations made him "doubt the required objectivity," writes Koch in the email. He also states that he cannot judge whether the convicted person was actually the perpetrator. Koch even offers the lawyer a personal interview if he wants to take action again to reopen the case.

The only stupid thing was that the lawyer to whom this email was addressed published it on his website.

Because it was only because of this that the now accused betrayal of secrets came to the public and led to charges against Koch.

Should the Dieburg district court, which initially only set one day of the trial, come to the conclusion that Koch was actually guilty of betrayal of secrets and would sentence him to more than a year in prison, Koch would have to give up his mayor's office, even if his detention was suspended would.

The court can even impose up to five years imprisonment for betrayal of secrets.

The accused mayor is calm

Koch himself is calm about the legal proceedings.

As he said in an interview with the FAZ, in the event of a conviction he would expect at most a fine.

“After all, I didn't reveal the submarine plans to North Korea and endanger Germany's security,” said the mayor with a touch of irony.

"Where was the criminal energy then?"

He will face the trial on Tuesday and is pleased with the great wave of sympathy that he has experienced over the past two days, said Koch.

The fact that the lawyer put the e-mail on the Internet shows him that the lawyer had not seen any confidentiality here.

"Otherwise he wouldn't have done that."

He does not know who reported him.

“I don't care either,” says the Pfungstadt mayor, who assumes that he will still be mayor next Wednesday.