Fuss about zschape letter to dortmund neo-nazis
"It is the order of the day that confiscated letters from prisoners are read out. A letter like this can shed light on the personality of the accused," lawyer jens rabe told the "suddeutsche zeitung" (SZ/saturday). The munich lawyer angelika lex suggested that the pen pal be called as a witness.
The long, handwritten letter was not objected to when zschape’s mail was checked because the munich higher regional court apparently considered the partly very personal lines to be irrelevant. The letter was only confiscated in the bielefeld-senne penitentiary. There, the neo-nazi, who according to SWR is said to have belonged to the banned "aid organization of national prisoners" (HNG), is currently serving a prison sentence of several years for robbery and extortion.
In the letter, which is also available to the german press agency (dpa), zschape writes, among other things, about her everyday life in prison, her presentation to the prison judge of the federal supreme court (BGH) and her fear of already being pre-judged. She also describes her feelings in long passages. The 38-year-old has so far refused to testify in court.
The representatives of the side camps consider the letter significant also for this reason. "This woman does not have an ego problem," berlin lawyer mehmet daimaguler told the SZ. His colleague sebastian scharmer voiced the suspicion that zschape could also have hidden political codes in the letter. "Suddenly she writes about not wanting to freeze at 18 degrees. This makes no sense at this point."The number 18 is often used in the neo-nazi scene as a synonym for adolf hitler, because A is the first and H the eighth letter in the alphabet.
In the letter, zschape mentions that she had known the dortmund neo-nazi for only two months. However, a letter from the north rhine-westphalia interior ministry to the federal prosecutor’s office says the "aubergewohnliche" correspondence may give clues that the two knew each other beforehand.
The terrorists of the "national socialist underground" (NSU) are also accused of one murder in dortmund – a total of ten, nine of them of small businessmen of turkish and greek origin. Zschape charged with complicity in all NSU attacks.
