The trial against seven alleged left-wing extremists began this Tuesday at the Higher Regional Court of Dresden, in eastern Germany, under strict security measures and amid protests by around twenty supporters. They are accused of having perpetrated violent attacks against alleged people of . According to the German Federal Prosecutor’s Office, six of the seven defendants, aged between 28 and 49, belonged to a criminal organization known as the Hammerbande (Hammer Gang) or Antifa Ost (Antifa East), which was founded, according to the indictment, in late 2017 or early 2018 in and around Leipzig, in the east of the country. The seventh is accused of supporting her.
Being part of a criminal organization and serious bodily injury are punishable by up to five and ten years in prison, respectively.
In the indictment, the Prosecutor’s Office attributes to the six men and one woman “militant anti-fascism” and extreme left-wing attitudes, as well as planning to attack members of with the aim of sending a signal to deter right-wing extremists. They must also respond for serious bodily injury, attempted murder and property damage. According to the Prosecutor’s Office, the attacks were carried out with different groups, both in Germany and abroad.
The attackers acted “in a planned and organized manner,” said chief prosecutor Alexandra Geilhorn when reading the 270-page indictment, according to the public broadcaster MDR. In some cases, the accused assumed that the victims could die, added the representative of the Prosecutor’s Office.
The focus is mainly on the accused Johann G., who is credited with a leadership position in the group. He is accused of planning the attacks and recruiting accomplices. Along with co-defendant Paul M., he also allegedly organized combat training for members. In some warehouses, the group kept, among other things, hitting tools, pepper spray, masking utensils and mobile phones. Johann G. was wanted for years until he was finally arrested a year ago on a train in Thuringia.
The arrests were carried out within the “Antifa Ost process”, which is how the set of investigations surrounding this series of far-left attacks in Saxony, Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt is known. In fact, the case, which will last until the summer of 2027, is actually the continuation of the trial against the student Lina E., sentenced in the same court, in 2023, to five years and three months in prison, and who was the romantic partner of the main defendant. Three other co-defendants received lesser sentences. A key witness incriminated them. Both they and the defendants now belonged to the same group led by Lina E. and Johann G.
According to the Prosecutor’s Office, the group would have committed a total of 14 attacks in Germany and abroad – in places such as Wurzen, Leipzig, Dessau-Rosslau, Dortmund, Erfurt and Budapest – in which 35 people were injured, some of them seriously. In the Hungarian capital, in February 2023, the last attacks took place against right-wing extremists who had participated in the neo-Nazi Day of Honor event. The investigation of what happened there was included under the name of Budapest case.
as a terrorist organization, something that surprised the German authorities since, as reported by a spokeswoman for the German Ministry of the Interior, “the potential danger posed by the group has already been considerably reduced in recent times” and “the ringleaders and most violent members of the group have already been convicted and are in prison or in police custody.” The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, as the secret services are known inside Germany, describes the association as a “violent network” of individuals, not an organization with a fixed hierarchy, and considers the network to be “clearly weakened” due to court proceedings, sentences and arrests.
