Wood attack – punk hit victim’s skull – 18 years in prison

The suspect pleaded “not guilty” to the alleged attempted murder. The verdict was not only for attempted murder, but also for grievous bodily harm. The suspect was also admitted to an institution for mentally deviant offenders. The verdict is not final.

A witness mixed up the date
The last day of negotiations was difficult. A witness mixed up the date and arrived at the trial from Lower Austria several hours late. The hearing lasted until Friday evening in the evenings.

The victim didn’t have time to fight back
The suspect has claimed from the outset that he had defended himself against an attack directed against him. He was “attacked directly,” picked up the square wood from the ground and “hit it as it moved. I didn’t want to aim for the head,” the 41-year-old said on the first day of the hearing in early November.

Witness filmed suspect with mobile phone
However, he was charged by a totally uninvolved witness who happened to observe the scene on his way home after going out with her boyfriend. The student chased the suspect and his two companions and filmed them with her mobile phone. She then went back to the crime scene and cared for the seriously injured. The 28-year-old testified in court that he was “hit on the head with full force”. She did not notice a previous attack on the suspect.

The suspect’s partner contradicted this on Friday on the second day of the hearing. Her boyfriend came home with the two companions after the incident and himself had a bloody wound on his head and nose and a black ear. Her partner told her that he was attacked by the men who brought the square wood. When the wood fell to the ground, he grabbed hold of it and claimed he had struck in defense.

According to their own statements, men wanted to “clap fascists”
The violent attack took place on the night of July 11, 2020 in Vienna-Simmering. The suspect – according to the public prosecutor – associated with the punk scene from a young age and formed by extreme left-wing ideas – was on his way to the Ernst Kirchweger house in the Favoriten district, which was besieged by right-wingers at the time. According to their own statements, the three “wanted to clap fascists”. They were heavily drunk and paraded through the streets long after midnight singing and roaring. The victim, who had just arrived home in a taxi and was about to go to his apartment, asked her about the volume and asked the group to turn it down.

Victim almost died after attack
This initially resulted in a verbal altercation that suddenly turned violent, with the suspect allegedly using squared timber that had come from a construction site – a school opposite the victim’s home was being renovated. The victim was already moving, the prosecutor emphasized. The defendant inflicted “massive and life-threatening injuries” on the man. If these had led to a cerebral hemorrhage or a pulmonary embolism, he would have died.”

The victim – payroll administrator by profession – was in hospital for weeks with multiple skull fractures and first had to learn to eat and walk again. He gave up his job because of persistent concentration problems.

I don’t remember the attack
The now 46-year-old is now doing better – apart from the consequences of a cruciate ligament rupture, because he fell unconscious to the ground after the blow and also suffered a corresponding injury when he fell. The man had no recollection of the act itself when he testified, but he dismissed the defendant’s claim on the first day of the trial that the aggression came from him as unfounded.

Even his former lifestyle does not necessarily indicate that the suspect acted in self-defense. He has no fewer than 17 previous convictions, most of them for extortion and assault. He has been in prison several times. Because he did not want to be arrested again after the incident, he went into hiding for a while.