Pain, grief and anger directed against the killers: Around six weeks after the brutal rape of 13-year-old Leonie in Vienna, her family is trying to deal with the horror of the girl’s death. It is even more difficult for the parents because they are being harassed and blamed on the internet for not having looked after their child. The suspects for the crime are four Afghans aged 16 to 23, who are being held in custody.
Due to the massive threats, police protection for the family was ordered, patrol cars are to provide security at their home, reports oe.24. The funeral is also to be secured with officers. Austria’s Federal Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (34) has also offered support for Leonie’s family, saying they can contact him personally at any time.
From whom the hate comments originate – it is unclear. But the accusations spread on social media are hateful. “Especially because people judge us who don’t even know us,” says mother Manuela in an interview with news.at “The things that are going to circulate – first we are the socially deprived ones who let their child go to seed.Then we are supposedly the ones who go from one medium to another to make money by using our child.
And of course we are supposedly the ones who failed as parents, who did not fulfil their duty of supervision. There’s this pain – and then on top of it all, you’re met with derisive comments.”Now it comes out: Leonie’s older sister was also cowardly attacked once, the mother reports further. At that time, the family was still living in Vienna. Her daughter had been beaten up by Chechens, and the perpetrators had filmed the attack! The attack was the reason why the family moved away from Vienna a few months before Leonie’s death, to Tulln, a small town about 40 kilometres northwest of the capital.
Leonie had gone to Vienna with a friend on June 25 – without the knowledge of her parents. A 16-year-old Afghan, whom she had met on Instagram, allegedly lured Leonie there. At the meeting on Vienna’s party mile, three of his fellow countrymen joined them, who then allegedly made Leonie submissive with drugs.
On the night of June 26, they brought Leonie to the flat of one of the men. There they drugged her with up to eleven Ecstasy tablets. Then began her ordeal, which lasted for hours: the men repeatedly attacked the defenceless girl, beat, strangled and raped her. Later, Leonie was “dumped” on a tree, then found by local residents.
The suspects are refugees from Afghanistan whose asylum applications were rejected. They have been convicted several times for drugs and assault. But they were not deported.
The men blame each other for the girl’s death. There is no trace of sympathy for their victim – instead only contempt: “It doesn’t matter that she is dead, she was a bitch anyway,” said one of the accused according to oe.24.