A man from Darmstadt has to go to prison for four years because he stabbed his neighbor in the heart.

The eleventh major criminal chamber of the Darmstadt Regional Court classified the act in July this year as manslaughter in a less serious case because the later victim had visited the 54-year-old Mauro P. in his apartment, insulted and threatened him.

The perpetrator was thus provoked and irritated, it said in the verdict on Thursday.

Jan Schiefenhoevel

Editor in the Rhein-Main-Zeitung.

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Prosecutor Ansgar Martinsohn had demanded a prison sentence of five years.

Mario Galvano, lawyer for the victim's widow, thought that the sentence was appropriate, although in fact he did not see it as manslaughter but merely assault resulting in death.

In her plea, defense attorney Judith Bernhard requested a three-year sentence for bodily harm resulting in death.

The neighbors had once been close friends, as Martinsohn pointed out in his plea.

Both are from Italy.

Mauro P. had taken the other man into his apartment when he came to Germany.

The accused later lived on the fourth floor of an apartment building on Wilhelminenstrasse in the city center, the victim on the third floor.

Mauro P. was often a guest of his compatriot and his wife, as the prosecutor explained.

The rift came in spring 2022 because Mauro P. did not wish the couple a happy Easter as usual.

The accused reacted flippantly to a complaint about this and was expelled from the couple's apartment.

In the following months, the two men would have insulted each other in mobile phone messages with crude insults.

Finally, on a day in July, as previously announced, the later victim rang the bell at the defendant's apartment, who had already had a combat knife ready near the apartment door.

The bloody deed happened after a scuffle.

Mauro P. hit the other man in the chest with the combat knife with a 15 centimeter long blade, "a very martial tool", said the presiding judge Volker Wagner.

The knife pierced the ribs and penetrated the body up to the handle.

"Anyone who stabs like that is unrestrained," said the judge.

With the massive bone structure of the victim, a lot of effort was required.

That is only conceivable with the will to kill.

Therefore, it is manslaughter and not assault resulting in death.

Shortly before the crime, the accused asked a friend in a message to take care of his dog and announced that he would kill the neighbor.

This proves that he mentally prepared the act and that he expected to be arrested.

Mauro P. was described by witnesses as a friendly and calm person.

However, he was able to kill someone else.

Man in itself is neither good nor bad, said Wagner: "The situation makes the perpetrator." In the time between Easter and the crime, the men repeatedly insulted each other in mobile phone messages, even on the morning of the day of the crime when they called each other referred to as "scum".

The accused saw his pride hurt and did not want to let the insults sit on him, hence the decision to kill, as the judge said: "Pride demanded it." Out of fear he did not commit the act of violence.

If he had been afraid, he would not have had to open the apartment door.

Conversely, the bloody deed would not have happened if the other man had stayed in his own apartment.

So this is a less serious case.