Lies and Trivialization, Part One

Frank Liebau and Jürgen Länger were called to testify today. From 1995 to 2007, Liebau was the proprietor of the “Medley” shop. It was in this shop that the silenced Ceska pistol was bought according to accused Schultze and another witness and that another pistol was bought for Wohlleben and the NSU according to accused Gerlach. The shop was an important meeting point given that it sold Nazi clothing, music encouraging violence and murder and everything else Nazi customers could hope for.

Liebau’s testimony went on for hours without him even giving one concrete answer. Whenever he did not want to say the truth or to conceal something, he would start to mumble almost incomprehensibly in a very broad Thuringian accent.
He stated that he had known Uwe Böhnhardt since his early youth and had been part of a common clique, but refused to remember what they had done. Uwe Mundlos and Ralf Wohlleben were known to him “in the same way”.

Another witness, Andreas Schulz, who is due to testify on 13 November, has stated that he had received the Ceska vom Länger and that Liebau had acted as a go-between. Liebau stated that he had visited Schulz about a week before the trial day – when asked about the content of their discussion, he again claimed not to remember. In earlier talks with Schulz, he claims to have said that he did not want to know anything. However, Schulz had told him that he had sold a firearm.

Liebau also claimed that the police officers writing the protocol of his police interrogation had written down lots of things he had not said, but that he had still signed that protocol in order to be done with the interrogation.

His testimony will continue on 13 November and will be a litmus test for the extent to which the presiding judge will allow a witness to dance on the edge between lying, claiming not to remember and generally not saying anything.

Länger has refused to testify since truthfully answering questions could lead to him being investigated as an accessory to murder. His testimony will continue on a later date; he will be accompanied by a lawyer.