First-instance guilty verdict for hammer attack in Basel confirmed
Published: Wednesday, Dec 4th 2024, 13:30
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On Wednesday, the Basel Court of Appeal confirmed the guilty verdict of attempted intentional homicide for the hammer attack on French central bank governor François Villeroy de Galhau in Basel in June 2022. The convicted perpetrator had appealed and demanded an acquittal.
According to the verdict of the Basel Criminal Court as the court of first instance, the 41-year-old Basel resident struck the head of the central bank with a hammer on Centralbahnplatz in Basel in June 2022, seriously injuring him. The criminal court declared the defendant clearly guilty of attempted intentional homicide on the basis of witness statements and DNA traces on the murder weapon.
However, due to paranoid schizophrenia, he was assessed as being unfit to stand trial, which is why inpatient psychiatric treatment was ordered.
"You don't need a psychiatrist"
The man again denied having committed the crime and contradicted the clinical picture that a psychiatric report had diagnosed. "I don't take neuroleptics, I don't need a psychiatrist," he said in response to a question from the presiding president of the three-judge court.
He also repeated that he had been pushed to the ground from behind by a stranger and had fallen on the hammer. He and his defense lawyer described the witness statements as untrustworthy and therefore useless; they had been influenced by the fact that the police had caught him and taken him away.
However, the Court of Appeal found the witnesses' statements and the circumstantial evidence to be credible. "Their version of the course of the crime is incomprehensible to us," said the presiding judge. There was also nothing wrong with the diagnosis from the psychiatric report.
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