By IANS
Leipzig (Germany) : A German excavator driver who was sentenced to eight months’ prison for leading a racist mob that beat up and chased eight Indian men has appealed his sentence, his lawyer said Wednesday.
Frank D, 23, did not accept the finding that he was a leader in the violence in the eastern German town of Muegeln in August, his counsel Ulf Ihle told DPA.
“The verdict is not logical,” said Ihle, saying the judge had mistakenly concluded the man was a mob leader.
The defendant was convicted of incitement to racial hatred Tuesday after he admitted hurling a metal grating through a window of a pizza parlour where the Indians took refuge. The pizzeria manager said he had shouted racial slurs and egged on the mob of 50.
The court rejected a proposal by prosecutors to suspend the term, saying Frank D. must go to prison as a “deterrent” to others and there were no legal grounds for leniency.
The deterrent sentence was the most severe in the case. Three other men were fined.
Prosecutors in the state of Saxony said they could not obtain enough evidence to charge four other suspects.
The minister of justice in Saxony state, Geert Mackenroth, earlier hailed the conviction, saying in a news release, “There is no place in Saxony for extremism and violence.”
The attack during a town festival made headlines round the world.
The court said the violence, in which the Indians suffered serious bruises and cuts, might have escalated into racial lynching if policemen on the spot had not immediately intervened. Two policemen were among the injured.
Prosecutors in the city of Leipzig said they were still investigating eight persons over a dance-tent brawl, reportedly between Germans and an Indian, before the attack and were treating this as a separate incident. Testimony about it was contradictory.