Juvenile detention
November 24, 2009
A court in Bonn has sentenced a 16-year-old German girl to five years in a juvenile detention center after she was found guilty of attempted murder, causing grievous bodily harm and preparing explosives.
Presiding judge Volker Kinkel said the teenager's plan had been to kill a large number of people at the Albert-Einstein school in Sankt Augustin, near Bonn. She was discovered, armed with petrol bombs and a short sword, in the school toilets as she was preparing to firebomb the school by a fellow student, whom she stabbed and injured seriously.
The stabbing victim and a teacher then raised the alarm and armed commandoes rushed to the scene to prevent a possible school massacre.
Prosecutors said the teenager had planned to stab her teacher with the blade, then lock the classroom door and set off the home-made firebombs.
The 16-year-old escaped from the school premises after trying to commit suicide but gave herself up the same day to police at Cologne's main train station. Doctors said the girl suffered from a personality disorder and depression.
During her trial the girl made a full confession, telling the court that she felt lonely and misunderstood. But the court decided that she could not claim to be suffering from diminished responsibility.
The incident last May came just two months after nine pupils, three teachers and three passers-by were killed in Winnenden, by a 17-year-old boy.
nrt/AFP/dpa
Editor: Michael Lawton