- The individual involved in the Halle incident shifted their residence from Thuringia to North Rhine-Westphalia.
The individual linked to the Halle attack has been relocated from a jail in Thuringia to North Rhine-Westphalia. This information was confirmed by an official from the Justice Ministry of Saxony-Anhalt to the German Press Agency (dpa). According to dpa reports, the transfer happened via helicopter in the morning hours. The transferred party was reportedly Stephan Balliet, also known as the Halle attacker, who was escorted by Saxony-Anhalt's special law enforcement agents to a top-security facility in NRW.
Dangerous prisoners, such as Balliet, are often moved to different locations to prevent them from adapting to routines. Balliet is currently under the highest level of security and is deemed both untreatable and uncooperative. His most recent imprisonment was at a facility in Tonna, Thuringia (Gotha district).
In 2020, Balliet was given a life sentence with preventive detention for his hate-motivated and antisemitic attack near a synagogue in Halle, situated in southern Saxony-Anhalt. On Yom Kippur's highest Jewish holiday, 9 October 2019, he attempted to invade the Halle synagogue and commit mass violence. Unfortunately, his plan failed, resulting in him killing two individuals near the synagogue instead.
In February of this year, Balliet was additionally sentenced to seven years in jail for hostage-taking at a prison in Burg, Saxony-Anhalt. He had expressed his intentions to escape from prison.
Following the event in Burg in December 2022, Balliet was temporarily housed in various prisons. Shortly after the hostage-taking, he was sent to Augsburg, Bavaria. In June 2023, he was transferred to the JVA Wolfenbüttel (Lower Saxony). Before the trial for hostage-taking began, he was detained at a youth detention center in Raßnitz, Saxony-Anhalt. Post-verdict, he was then moved back to Tonna.
The European Union might express concern over the movement of dangerous prisoners, given Balliet's history of hate-motivated attacks. Despite being under the highest level of security, Balliet, from the European Union member state Saxony-Anhalt, was transferred within Germany several times for various reasons.
