Impaired victim

Imprisonment after rape in the station toilet

The accused Syrian denied the acts.

(Bild: Chantal Dorn / Krone Kreativ, Krone KREATIV)

A 27-year-old Syrian with a criminal record was sentenced to five years' imprisonment for rape and sexual assault by the jury of the Feldkirch Regional Court (Vorarlberg) on Friday.

The unemployed man had only pleaded guilty in one case. And that was only on the basis of evidence from a surveillance camera. The unemployed refugee was forced to admit that he had groped an 18-year-old woman's bottom at Dornbirn train station last spring. During the trial, the accused did not want to remember the other two acts he was accused of. Or rather, he categorically denied them.

"Don't know him"
For example, an assault on an 18-year-old man at Götzis train station in April last year, from whom he tried to force a kiss. "I don't know him at all", said the Syrian on the record. However, when the judge asked the victim whether the accused was the perpetrator, the 18-year-old was absolutely certain. "Yes, that's him!" He then describes the situation to the court once again.

That he had been followed by the accused on the Götzis platform that evening and that he had initially wanted to kiss him on the forehead. "When I told him not to do that, he grabbed me by the back of the neck with both hands and tried to kiss me on the mouth." The sexually assaulted man then alerted the police.

The most reprehensible act that the public prosecutor's office accuses the Syrian of is the rape of a mentally impaired man. In June last year, the accused allegedly dragged the 58-year-old, who was waiting for the train to work that morning, off the platform and ordered him to come with him to the toilet. The disabled man obeyed. In the toilet, the accused allegedly pushed the 58-year-old against the wall, raped him and fled. When the victim told his carers about the "man at the station" the next day, they raised the alarm.

Surveillance camera recorded
The surveillance camera recording also led to success in this case. Confronted with the recording, which shows the accused holding the 58-year-old by the arm and marching towards the toilet, the defendant plays dumb again and says: "So what? We just happen to be walking next to each other. I don't know him." In the end, the panel of lay judges saw things differently. The presiding judge, Franziska Klammer, found the Syrian guilty as charged and sentenced him to five years in prison.

A further 14 months were added from a suspended prison sentence. She awarded the 58-year-old rape victim 4000 euros in damages. In her reasoning, Klammer says: "The panel of lay judges has no doubts about the credibility of the victim. As far as the rape victim's accounts are concerned, she would not even be mentally capable of inventing the story." The verdict is final.