54-year-old convicted

Man (54) allegedly paid for online rape

The trial took place at Ried Regional Court.

(Bild: ©Constantin Handl)

What goes on in a person like this? A 54-year-old man who allegedly ordered sexual acts against underage girls in the Philippines in online chats stood trial in Ried (Upper Austria). He had also ordered the rape of a 15-year-old girl: four years in prison, not legally binding.

The previously blameless electrician (54) - he is married and has an adult daughter - is said to have initially chatted rather casually with women in the Philippines and watched live shows, according to the public prosecutor. A local contact woman recognized that he was apparently interested in children and offered him child abuse on camera. Over a period of four years, the man is said to have consumed live chats and images in return for money, eventually suggesting that he rape a 15-year-old girl on camera. He said this "just for fun", the accused justifies himself. According to the public prosecutor, however, he was well aware that the contact woman would carry it out.

"Provider" already convicted
The woman has already been sentenced to many years in prison and four children were rescued from her clutches. The Austrian was arrested in 2023 and is currently in custody. According to his defense lawyer Andreas Mauhart, he "felt it was more like a computer game at the time" and was not aware "that this was a reality elsewhere". His client had confessed and was undergoing therapy.

Accused remorseful
"Now I can say that I can be heinous," said the accused himself, saying that he had understood "what is done to children". At the same time, he does not want to have meant the commission of the rape seriously. "I wrote it, but I never wanted it to be carried out," he claimed to the amazement of the public prosecutor - after all, the accused had been sent videos of the abuse. "How could you have believed that this was fiction?"

The confession was not credible for the judge: "These acts were presented to the defendant in real life", he should have known that it was not fiction. The chats showed that even the contact woman was "perplexed by the defendant's wishes". "We in the West are commissioning the poor people in the East with the abuse," he said, seeing a "particularly high level of moral injustice". With a penalty range of one to ten years, the sentence was four years in prison. The defense and public prosecutor's office made no statement, so the verdict is not legally binding.

Another case in the Innviertel region
The abuse case involving Filipino children is not the only one currently pending at the regional court in Ried. Since the end of January, an office manager, who is also alleged to have used a local authority computer for his crimes, has been in custody awaiting trial. In November of the previous year, a 37-year-old man in Wels was sentenced to 15 years in prison and sent to a forensic-therapeutic center. He is alleged to have abused four girls in Upper Austria, collected thousands of child abuse images since 2017 and commissioned and viewed abuse in Southeast Asia in live chats.