Lies and Trivialization, Part 13 – Once more on the „White Brotherhood in the Iron Mountains“ and on „Blood & Honour“

The first witness today was André Kö., a former member of the „White Brotherhood in the Iron Mountains“ (Weiße Bruderschaft Erzgebirge, WBE) led by André and Maik Eminger. He claimed not to be right-wing anymore, while sporting a rather large “Blut und Ehre” (German for “Blood and Honour”)-tattoo on his shaved head. No big surprise that this witness, like many before him, claimed not to remember any details concerning the WBE, but rather tried to downplay his earlier statements to the police, claiming that he had not worded things “as crassly” when talking about violence against foreigners etc. What he did confirm was that André and Maik Eminger were founders and leading members of the WBE.

He was followed by Stephan Lange, former leader of the Blood & Honour “Division” Germany. He tried to present B&H as purely a “music movement”, even claimed that it had been founded solely to guard against intra-scene attacks by Hammerskins. He did not change his tune even when presiding judge Götzl showed that he did not believe his strategy of trivialization, even explicitly discussed the consequences of perjury, even when several clearly political articles from the B&H magazine were read out. Later, he at least reported that there had been B&H members who proposed a strategy more in line with “Combat 18”, i.e. armed attacks against migrants, leftists etc. However, he claimed not to remember any details.

The Wohlleben and Zschäpe defenses once again followed their strategy of torpedoing the questioning by objecting to questions – once again largely without success. Interestingly, the Zschäpe defense even claimed that all questions concerning “B&H” were without relevance to the proceedings – a claim met with an incredulous shake of the head not only on the court bench.