Isabella Mueller (crime writer)
A scandalous double miscarriage of justice occurred at the Osnabrück Regional Court in 1995, which completely turned the lives of two innocent people upside down and almost ruined them. But how could it have come to pass that two men had to spend years behind bars despite being innocent? In 1994, 18-year-old student Amelie claimed that her father had raped her 10 times over the past 6 years. He had also performed an abortion on her with a coat hanger. The driver Adolf S. was subsequently sentenced to 7 years in prison. Amelie now also accused her uncle Bernhard M. of four counts of rape. He vehemently denied the allegations. In the first trial, an inspection refuted that a rape as described by Amelie in the Toyota Corolla would have been impossible due to the body measurements of those involved. The judge offered Bernhard M.’s lawyer a suspended sentence if he confessed to rape. However, Bernhard M. withdrew his lawyer’s mandate. A new trial was held with a new lawyer. In this trial, the exonerating circumstances were completely disregarded, despite the same judge and prosecutor. Bernhard M. was sentenced to 4.5 years in prison on January 29, 1996. Both convictions were based solely on Amelie’s statements. The appeals were rejected by the Federal Court of Justice in both cases. What no one knew, and what was covered up from the outset, was the fact that Amelie suffered from a borderline personality disorder and was being treated for it by a psychiatrist. However, the psychiatrist denied Amelie’s treatment during the trial so as not to jeopardize the credibility of her statements. Amelie, who lived with her grandparents after a dispute with her sometimes violent father, was admitted to a youth psychiatric ward after attempting suicide due to heartbreak, where she regularly cut herself with broken glass. She also took pills indiscriminately, wrote suicide notes, and made further attempts at suicide. In the meantime, both her uncle and her father had served their full prison sentences. Then, in 2002, the unbelievable happened: a court reporter published her research on the two verdicts, exposing a double miscarriage of justice. She had been made aware of the cases by a forensic pathologist. After extensive research, she turned to a criminal defense attorney, who initially drafted a retrial for Bernhard M. and submitted it on May 2, 2002. This was based on the following points. Due to a meningitis infection in infancy, Bernhard M. had an alibi. He did not have a stable erection and was not capable of sexual intercourse. In addition, there had been collusion between Amelie and her caregiver. Furthermore, Amelie had simply changed the date of the rape during the main hearing after a witness had given Bernhard M. an alibi for that date. Amelie had learned this from an investigating officer, whereupon she simply changed the date. As mentioned above, the rape could not have taken place in the Toyota Corolla due to lack of space. In addition, Amelie took the anticoagulants Marcumar and Aspirin to inflict hematomas on herself. Since Amelie suffered from borderline personality disorder, her credibility was severely limited. The new trial against Bernhard M. ended on December 14, 2005, with an acquittal. Bernhard M. had been proven innocent. Afterwards, the defense attorney requested a retrial for Adolf S., who was acquitted on October 2, 2006, without a new trial. It was scandalous that Amelie’s statements were simply believed without any solid evidence and that the diagnosis of borderline personality disorder was deliberately concealed, as was a letter Amelie had written in which she confessed that her accusations were fabricated, in order not to jeopardize Amelie’s credibility in court. The criminal investigation department had not secured any traces of semen and unlawfully passed on information about the ongoing investigation to both the victim and the clinic management. Furthermore, the Osnabrück Regional Court did not obtain independent psychiatric assessments of the witness in either trial. Even the assessment of Bernhard M., despite his sexual appetite disorder, was omitted. Although the innocence of the two men was proven, a bitter aftertaste remains for the rest of their lives.
