Although the sex was consensual – the 13-year-old had paid for a hotel room rented for it – the defendant was found guilty of serious sexual abuse of minors. For this he received 15 months in prison, which he received a conditional sentence.
The teenager had met the underage girl through her uncle, with whom he was friends at the time. They exchanged numbers, communicated via Snapchat and then entered into a relationship. After a few months, he asked the girl “if she wanted to sleep with me. The first time she said no. After a while she said yes. It was amicable,” the now 19-year-old described to a jury (chairman). : Katharina Adegbite-Lewy).
Rented hotel room
In order to become intimate with each other, the young couple rented a hotel room for a short time on February 13th and 15th, 2023. The first time the 13-year-old took over the bill, the second time the two shared the costs. The defendant emphasized that he was aware that sex with girls under 14 was forbidden. However, he didn’t know her real age: “I told her I was 18 years old. She told me she was 18 years old. We didn’t talk about details. She said she was still going to school .” The presiding judge then showed the 19-year-old a photo of the girl that was part of the investigation: “And she is 18 for you?” – “Yes,” the boy replied with conviction. “The age was never discussed,” assured defense attorney Martin Mahrer, who then added, “that the girl must look significantly older than 13, otherwise the receptionist wouldn’t have given her a room in the hotel.”
The 13-year-old reported the teenager after he hadn’t contacted her for weeks after the second intimate meeting. The defendant noted in court that he then attended a driving license course abroad.
“I do not have a problem with it”
The 19-year-old was not only incriminated by the 13-year-old, who was questioned during the preliminary investigation and whose videotaped statement was played in camera in the courtroom. The girl’s 17-year-old uncle and former boyfriend of the defendant claimed that at the first meeting in his apartment, in her presence, he had revealed his niece’s childish age and asked him “not to do anything with her and not to write to her.” after the defendant said it was “beautiful”. The defendant said to the jury that such a remark had never been made: “Excuse me, do you think I would be so stubborn as to enter into a relationship with a twelve-year-old (the girl was only twelve when we met, note)? ” The witness is not telling the truth: “He is her uncle. It goes without saying that he sticks by her.”
A friend of the 13-year-old claimed that she met the defendant and the 13-year-old at a tram station shortly after the two met. The boy told her his age on his own initiative, whereupon she explained to him that she was 15 and her friend – the defendant’s partner at the time – was 13. The defendant replied: “I know, I don’t have a problem with it.” The 19-year-old also rejected this statement as incorrect, pointing out that when you get to know your girlfriend’s acquaintances, you don’t immediately communicate their age.
“I loved her, so to speak.”
When the judge asked why the 13-year-old should have hidden her true age from him, the 19-year-old replied: “Because of her parents.” “And that didn’t seem strange to you?” the judge asked. “Yes,” replied the boy, “but I loved her, so to speak.”
The Senate needed a longer period of deliberation to ultimately reach a guilty verdict as charged. “We saw the photos, we saw the girl in the adversarial interrogation. In any case, she doesn’t look 18,” the chairwoman stated in the reasons for the verdict. In addition, it is “unrealistic that you have known someone as long as you have known the girl and don’t talk about their age.” The 13-year-old’s uncle and her friend were “credible to the court. There is no reason why they should incriminate you.”
With a penalty of one to ten years, the 19-year-old received 15 months of probation. The girl, who had joined the criminal proceedings as a private party, was awarded 1,000 euros. Probation was ordered for the young man. After consulting with his defense attorney, he agreed to everything. The public prosecutor accepted the verdict as it was.
