A female hobby gardener was pruning mahonias in her front garden when a man came by and stabbed her into a coma. On Tuesday, the trial began at the Berlin Regional Court.
The defendant is Abdul Malik A. (29) from Afghanistan. In Berlin since 2015. Living in a flat in Wilmersdorf. “A really nice guy,” his cousin tells the newspaper BILD. An insidious murderer whom others prevented from completing his bloody work, says the Berlin Attorney General’s Office.
Flashback: It is September 4, 2021, Saturday, 1.30 p.m. Regina G. (58) is pruning shrubs in front of her rented house on the streets Güntzelstrasse and Prinzregentenstrasse in Wilmersdorf. Shortly afterwards, nothing is the same anymore: stitches in her neck and head, coma, forever an invalid. She only survived because her neighbour Klaus F. (66) intervened saying, “Tell me, are you crazy, leave the woman alone!”
The male nurse plays the drums and was coming back from rehearsal. This is how he experienced the insane attack: “I see a dressed-up man in a blue caftan, blue trousers, pressed pleats. The woman is working with the hedge trimmer in the front garden. He kicks her from behind. A scream. She kneels. He holds her by the hair with his right hand, a knife to her neck with his left.”
Klaus F. continues: “I shout: ‘Leave the woman alone!’ He looks pityingly. Drops her. Goes for me. Hits me in the throat and larynx. I run to the barbershop with the remaining power, shouting: ‘Call the police, he wants to kill the woman!
The knifeman smiles. He claims self-defence: “The woman attacked me! She had a big pair of scissors. I only had a small knife for bread and melons.” The judge: “Did it bother you that the woman was cutting flowers?” The knife man gently: “Yes, beautiful flowers, please don’t cut them, I said.” His lawyer emphasises: “He has no problem with women!”
A police officer (49) who arrested him at the time: “He talked about how Allah had ordered him to kill the woman because she kept cutting the flowers.
Instead of jail, the knifeman is now behind bars in a psychiatric hospital. “The food is better there, too,” he says contentedly. The judge: “The woman is paralysed today!” The accused: ” Allah sees everything. Mistakes happen. I am not a terrorist. Send me back home. Or release me!”
The verdict is to be handed down on May 24.