How is it possible - I ask - that even after seven years he could not integrate into this society, he did not learn German, he did not acquire a profession, he was a part-time helper, he was still living in a refugee hostel after seven years and he dreamed of an Ethiopian wife?

Recently, on July 4, 2023, the district court in Ulm handed down the most severe sentence, life imprisonment, to a 27-year-old Eritrean murderer.

The anecdote that came to my mind yesterday, in connection with the verdict of the district court in Ulm, comes from the Kádár era. It is not a nice thing to associate a cruel, knife murder with an anecdote, but it was not the murder, but a supposed moment of it that reminded me of this old Hungarian story.

During the existing socialism, there was an educational institution in Hungary - the International Preparatory Institute - where young people from developing countries worthy of a better fate (joining the socialist camp) were prepared for participation in Hungarian higher education. The mostly African, Arab, South American and Vietnamese young people studied our language, culture and the subjects they needed to know at university in the spirit of socialist internationalism.

They built a beautiful three-hundred-bed dormitory for them on Budaörsi út, that certain haunted high-rise building that is now doomed to be demolished.

It once happened that one of them took an exam at the University of Technology, and of course he didn't know anything. When the teacher wanted to enter the insufficient in his index, he pulled out a knife from under his jacket and pointed it at the shocked professor's neck. Three, he hissed, and the teacher had probably written three for him, just don't let that blade tickle his neck any longer. I don't know what would have happened if he had resisted, the black boy was quite determined and maybe frustrated that he couldn't do what he was sent here to this foreign country for. At the time, we laughed a lot at this story, perhaps not half of which was true.

in any case, it has become a byword for "three".

A few days ago, on July 4, 2023, the Ulm District Court handed down the most severe sentence, life imprisonment, to a 27-year-old knife killer. The Eritrean boy, known for his polite, reserved and calm nature, on an Advent morning

He killed a 14-year-old girl trying to go to school with 23 knife stabs and fatally injured her 13-year-old girlfriend.

He didn't originally want to kill the girls, they just got in his way. The murderous rage had been simmering in him for some time, he felt that the German authorities had ruined his life, that they were not giving him what he expected. For example, they don't give him a passport so he can travel freely, even home. Because he wanted to go there, he wanted to travel home to Ethiopia, he wanted to get a wife from there to solve his lack of companionship and sexual frustration. No wife-no life! he folded.

It didn't occur to him that if he was going home, he might as well stay at home.

On the morning of the crime, he wanted to go to the district asylum office to use a knife to force the release of his passport. When he stepped out of the gate of the refugee hostel, he noticed the two girls he recognized by sight, and suddenly thought that they recognized his murderous intent. He was afraid that they would see the knife on him and report him to the police, so he attacked them. It could also be that he wanted to take revenge on the girls. According to the forensic expert, there could be no question of a crime committed out of anger and a personality disorder was ruled out.

There should be a psychiatrist who dares to find a mental disorder after this and who could decipher the immediate root cause.

How could he imagine that he could force an official with a knife, intimidate him with violence, so that he would finally give him an official document? - asked the Germans, taken aback, because they do not understand this world, its working mechanism. "Three", came to my mind right away, even though it was only an innocent (?) situation in the university exam 50 years ago, but the emotions and the solution mechanisms have not changed much over time. How can it be that a quiet, hardworking, reliable black boy who came to Germany with the wave of refugees in 2015, was carried away by such an act? they ask.

How is it possible - I ask - that even after seven years he could not integrate into this society, he did not learn German, he did not acquire a profession, he was a part-time helper, after seven years he was still living in a refugee hostel and dreaming of an Ethiopian wife.

His mental problems were treated by a psychologist in the German way, i.e. without empathy. After committing his act, he wanted to commit suicide, but even that did not succeed.

The murder stirred up tempers. Illerkirchberg is a predominantly Catholic settlement in Baden-Württemberg with a population of five thousand. Based on the German quota law for the distribution of refugees, Illerkirchberg also accepted the prescribed number of mostly young men. In 2019, four such men raped a 14-year-old girl at the refugee hostel. The perpetrators are already at large, one of them has just been returned by the French police. His asylum application has already been rejected, but he will not be deported home, because Afghanistan is not a safe country. And so he wanders around Europe without borders, until the latent tension or male power in him resurfaces.

The office workers were shocked by the original intention of the attacker. Now they demand protective equipment for themselves, bullet- and knife-resistant glass for the clerk's window. Or maybe they will be more lenient, they will issue papers and permits that do not comply with the regulations, i.e. they will give the "three" rather than paying with their lives for compliance with the European order. The victim himself has a migrant background, the child of an integrated Turkish family. He was already born here, he was socialized here. The parents wrote an open letter to the local community. "No amount of resentment and anger is worth sacrificing our common peace," and they asked that their position not be abused by any politics. The refugee hostel was condemned for demolition, its place would be sprinkled with salt, or rather grass seed, they want to create a park there, the park of reconciliation.

It is strange to hear this now during the French riots.

If the Turkish father had stabbed the Eritrean attacker in his pain and helplessness, or if someone else, such as a policeman, had shot him, the ball might have stopped and a wave of migrant anger similar to France would have swept through Germany.

Instead, the Christian-minded locals preach reconciliation, forgive and continue to believe that there is a good policy of inclusion and that everyone has the right to a better and more beautiful European life.

Nevertheless, I suspect that the French riots played a part in the swift and severe judgment in the case. Toughness had to be shown, the strong action of power and law, this is the only thing that helps. After all, the violence could even spread here, the French border is only two hundred kilometers from Illerkirchberg.

Irén Rab, historian

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