UPDATE - German court rules prominent neo-Nazi must stay jailed until at least 2035

UPDATES WITH COURT ANNOUNCEMENT DETAILS, CHANGES HEADLINE, EDITS THROUGHOUT

By Ayhan Simsek

BERLIN (AA) - A German court announced Tuesday that convicted neo-Nazi terrorist Beate Zschaepe will stay behind bars until at least 2035, turning down her request for early release.

In a decision dated Oct. 23, the Munich Higher Regional Court set her minimum detention period at 24 years, including time already served in pre-trial detention since November 2011.

In its Tuesday statement, the court noted that Zschaepe, 51, has now admitted she knew in advance about nine of the 10 murders planned by the far-right National Socialist Underground (NSU).

“She has basically acknowledged her guilt and also admitted acts of participation in the murders,” the court said.

According to the court, she expressed “shame about having destroyed or massively impaired the lives of innocent, arbitrarily selected people.” She distanced herself from the far-right ideology underlying the crimes. Her conduct in prison offered “no indications of a continuing right-wing extremist attitude.”

Despite those factors, the court concluded they do not outweigh her “exceptionally high degree of guilt.” Release after the statutory minimum of 15 years is therefore not justified, it concluded. Federal prosecutors had sought 25 years. Her lawyers asked for no more than 20.

Zschaepe was a key member of the NSU terror group which murdered 8 Turkish immigrants, a Greek citizen, and a German police officer, between 2000 and 2007. She was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2018 for her involvement in the group's crimes.

Last year, Zschaepe applied to the EXIT rehabilitation program, which helps individuals disengage from far-right extremism, in an effort to secure early release.

Relatives of the NSU victims strongly opposed her release, stressing that she had shown no genuine remorse and had refused to provide investigators with substantive information about the murders, the group’s wider support network, or possible links to intelligence informants.

- NSU's racist murders

The NSU carried out a series of racially motivated killings, bombings, and robberies across Germany between 2000 and 2007.

The group's existence and responsibility for the murders came to light in 2011, when two of its members, Uwe Mundlos and Uwe Bohnhardt, died by suicide following a failed bank robbery.
Evidence subsequently uncovered by investigators linked the group to the killings.

For years, German police and intelligence agencies had largely dismissed possible racist motives, instead investigating victims' families and alleged connections to organized crime and drug trafficking.

Media investigations later revealed that Germany's domestic intelligence agency, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), and its regional branches had numerous informants with past contacts with NSU suspects.

Authorities, however, maintained that they had no prior knowledge of the terror cell's existence or its involvement in the murders.

The scandal sparked a nationwide debate over institutional racism and failures within Germany's security and intelligence services, which faced criticism for underestimating the threat of far-right extremism.

Ayhan Şimşek