Germany’s top court on Monday rejected an appeal of a terrorist from the German right-wing extremist group the National Socialist Underground (NSU), Beate Zschäpe, the only known survivor of a far-right group, against her conviction and life sentence for her part in the killing of 10 people, almost all with migrant roots.
The Federal Constitutional Court ruled that Beate Zschäpe had failed to demonstrate that her fundamental judicial rights had been violated.
A Munich regional court found Zschäpe guilty in 2018 of 10 counts of murder for her role in the National Socialist Underground group’s killing of nine men, eight of Turkish origin and one Greek, as well as a police officer between 2000 and 2007.
The scandal broke on Nov. 4, 2011, when two neo-Nazis committed suicide after an unsuccessful bank robbery in the eastern city of Eisenach. For the first time, the German public learned about the existence of a neo-Nazi group named the NSU. The NSU is believed to have been founded by neo-Nazis Uwe Mundlos, Uwe Bohnhardt and Beate Zschäpe in the late 1990s. The trio lived a clandestine life for nearly 13 years, apparently without arousing the suspicions of the German police or intelligence services.
The group's only surviving member Zschäpe was convicted of membership in a terrorist organization, participating in two bomb attacks and more than a dozen bank robberies, and of attempted murder for setting fire to the group’s hideout after its existence came to light.
Although Zschäpe denied having been present for any of the killings, the court concluded she was involved in planning each one. Her two accomplices, Uwe Mundlos and Uwe Boehnhardt, killed themselves in 2011 in an effort to avoid arrest following a botched robbery. Zschäpe burned down the flat they shared, sent out a confession video and turned herself in to the police.
After having her appeal denied by Germany's Federal Court of Justice last year, she brought her case before the constitutional court.
