Trial in Feldkirch

Acquittal for aunt after group sex with niece

The 30-year-old aunt was acquitted of the charge of contributing to a rape.

(Bild: Dorn Chantall/Krone KREATIV)

Panic attacks, suicidal thoughts, nightmares, anorexia. And all because of an alleged rape that the aunt of the victim, who was 16 at the time, had failed to prevent. She had to answer to the Feldkirch Regional Court on Friday.

The case dates back six and a half years. However, it was only years after the alleged rapes that charges were brought. But not from the alleged victim - it was the 30-year-old aunt who went to the police because the girl suddenly accused her of having been raped by the two sex partners after a threesome in March 2018. The aunt neither prevented the rape nor called for help. Instead, the woman is said to have provided condoms and told the victim not to "behave so stupidly".

As a result, the investigation got rolling, proceedings were initiated against the aunt and the case was heard by a single judge in August last year. The result was that, following the adversarial interrogation of the victim, it was suspected that the accused aunt could have been guilty of contributing to rape by providing the condoms and saying that she should not behave like that. Which is considered a crime and must therefore be tried before the lay jury.

"It was simply group sex"
This is what happened on Friday. During the trial, the accused stood by her previous statements. She claims that no rape took place. It was "simply group sex" and, above all, voluntary. They also went for a cigarette in between and then swapped partners. According to the aunt, the niece could have left the apartment at any time.

This was contradicted by the testimony of the victim, who was questioned in court and claimed to have said several times that she did not want to have sex. One of the men had initially forced her to have oral sex. After a smoke break in the living room, the other man dragged her by the hair back into her aunt's bedroom, where she was choked almost to unconsciousness due to her resistance and finally forced to have sexual intercourse.

The mother knew about it
When the victim's mother, an author of raunchy dime novels, testified that her daughter had told her the following day about what had happened in her aunt's apartment in the basement of the communal house, Judge Silke Wurzinger asked: "Then why didn't you confront her sister immediately with the allegations and confront her?" Whereupon the witness states that she promised her daughter she would: "My daughter said that my sister had threatened her with serious consequences and that the matter would be repeated if she told anyone about it. The men knew where she lived." The accused aunt added: "I was simply embarrassed by the threesome with my niece and the two men. That's why I didn't want her to tell anyone else about it."

I was simply embarrassed by the foursome with my niece and the two men. That's why I didn't want her to tell anyone else about it.

Die Angeklagte vor Gericht

Acquittal due to many inconsistencies
For lawyer Andrea Concin, who defended the accused, it was incomprehensible that family parties were celebrated between the alleged rape and the complaint and that the alleged victim sent kissing emojis to the accused aunt via WhatsApp. In the end, the jury also came to this conclusion, acquitting the aunt of the charge of being a contributory offender. The verdict is not yet final.