Regional court admits charges against ex-KSK commander
Following the ammunition affair at the Special Forces Command (KSK), the Tübingen Regional Court has admitted the charges against the former KSK commander, Brigadier General Markus Kreitmayr. A date for the trial has not yet been set, a court spokesman explained on Wednesday. However, the trial will take place in the new year at the earliest.
The public prosecutor's office accuses Kreitmayr of failing to cooperate in criminal proceedings (Section 40 of the German Military Criminal Code). According to the prosecution, this is comparable to the criminal offense of obstruction of justice. According to the public prosecutor's office, the background to this is that considerable shortages were discovered in the KSK ammunition store in Calw during the annual ammunition inventory for 2019. The value of the missing ammunition amounted to around 28,000 euros.
The brigadier general was aware of the inventory report, the public prosecutor's office had stated. Kreitmayr had then decided that the soldiers could return ammunition anonymously and with impunity. More ammunition had been handed in than the shortfall.
The core of the accusation was that the then KSK commander should at least have expected that some of the ammunition had been stolen. The anonymous return of the ammunition in spring 2020 had made it impossible to prosecute these crimes.
Kreitmayr's lawyers, Christian Mensching and Bernd Müssig, stated on Wednesday: "The allegations made against General Kreitmayr in the indictment are unfounded in fact and in law; the defense assumes that the indictment will not stand up in court." The indictment is not legally viable.
"However, since the public prosecutor's office - contrary to the system - has brought charges before the regional court, it is legally understandable for the defense that the criminal chamber would like to deal with the arguments in a main hearing." According to the lawyers, arguments could have already been heard in the interim proceedings.
When the indictment was filed in February 2022, the lawyers stated: "In any case, the priority collection of ammunition parts and ammunition in the association followed the prioritization under emergency aspects; a reported shortage had to be clarified and ammunition had to be prevented from possibly falling into the wrong hands." It was never about covering up criminal acts.
Kreitmayr had not had any indications of criminal acts in the association. Rather, there had only been indications of accounting, documentation and possibly also storage errors that had been accumulating in the association for some time, which had to be clarified and remedied. "It goes without saying that the facts should be reported in full once they have been clarified."
Kreitmayr is presumed innocent until the legal conclusion of the proceedings.
The public prosecutor's office argues that Brigadier General Kreitmayr's decision to allow anonymous, impunity-granted ammunition returns was a failure to uphold justice, potentially aiding in the defense of ammunition theft. During the trial, the defense will argue that the charges against Kreitmayr are factually and legally unfounded, and that the public prosecutor's office's actions are not typical of the German system.
Despite not having indications of criminal acts, the processes within the association required Kreitmayr to address potential accounting, documentation, and storage issues, which he aimed to resolve and report once fully clarified.
Source: www.dpa.com
