Was passiert mit straffälligen Beamten - Strafrecht MPP

Abuse of power at Göttingen University — what happens to delinquent civil servants?

Sadly, the Georg-August-Univer­sität Göttingen has had to deal with several inci­dents in recent years in which lectu­rers have blatantly exploited their posi­tion of power over female students.

A professor of forestry and whale ecology was accused of unwanted touching, sexist remarks and exces­sive alcohol consump­tion in 44 cases. The Göttingen Admi­nis­tra­tive Court was able to estab­lish miscon­duct and sexual harass­ment in several cases (VG Göttingen v. 11.10.2023, Ref. 5 A 2/18).

In May 2018, a former lecturer in the Depart­ment of Biology alle­gedly sexu­ally harassed a female student during a rese­arch project in the forest by mastur­ba­ting in her presence “for rese­arch purposes” and ejacu­la­ting on a meat sample. In doing so, he alle­gedly kneaded her buttocks and stroked her back. The man was sentenced to a suspended sentence of six months by the Göttingen Regional Court.

Another professor of forestry had to answer to the Göttingen Regional Court for the first time in 2022.

The now convicted univer­sity lecturer used physical violence against several female employees over a long period of time — a doctoral student who had come to Germany for her disser­ta­tion was parti­cu­larly affected. Between 2014 and 2016, the professor regu­larly summoned her to his office, locked the door from the inside and hit his employee on the (some­times unclo­thed) buttocks, calves and chest with a bamboo stick about 60 cm long.

He appar­ently regarded the physical abuse as a kind of “punish­ment ritual” — a measure that sounds like it comes from the last century. The doctoral student in ques­tion put up with the violence and humi­lia­tion because her employer announced that he would other­wise termi­nate the super­vi­sion of her disser­ta­tion. In two inci­dents, he told her that he wanted to “prepare herfor a future job”. The doctoral student then feared for her profes­sional and finan­cial future.

During the trial, the defence wanted to create the impres­sion that the victim must have been fami­liar with beatings as a punish­ment ritual from her home country of Vietnam; a stra­tegy that probably did not work, not least because of its racist and sexist basis — the court rejected the defence’s corre­spon­ding motions for evidence.

The Göttingen Regional Court (judge­ment of 30 March 2022, 1 KLs 11/19) sentenced the defen­dant to a suspended sentence of eleven months.

Follo­wing a successful appeal by the public prosecutor’s office and the joint plain­tiff, the sentence is now 18 months’ suspended impri­son­ment for dange­rous bodily harm in office (Section 340 (1), (3) in conjunc­tion with Section 224 (1) No. 2 Alt. 2 StGB), coer­cion (Section 240 StGB) and depri­va­tion of liberty (Section 239 StGB). In addi­tion, the professor must pay a sum of money to the Göttingen women’s refuge as well as to the doctoral student and other women affected.

The increased threat of punish­ment in Section 340 StGB already makes it clear that civil servants occupy a special posi­tion in criminal law. The thir­tieth section of the Criminal Code (Sections 331 to 358) regu­lates the special features for public offi­cials in detail.

But what do offen­ders face in addi­tion to the conse­quences under criminal law with regard to their status as civil servants?

The requi­re­ments for an actual exclu­sion from civil servant status are high: A glance at Section 24 of the Civil Servant Status Act (BeamtStG) reveals that civil servants only lose their civil servant status if they have been sentenced to at least one year’s impri­son­ment for an inten­tional offence or at least six months’ impri­son­ment for certain state secu­rity offences or bribery.

The corre­spon­ding conse­quences are governed by Sections 33 et seq. of the Lower Saxony Civil Service Act (NBG ).

Pursuant to Section 33 (1) sentence 1 NBG, the former civil servant is not entitled to any bene­fits from the employer. This means that not only the salary but also all pension entit­le­ments, inclu­ding survi­ving depen­dants’ pensions, are lost. The persons concerned ther­e­fore no longer have any pension entit­le­ments and are subse­quently insured by law (Section 8 II 1 No. 1 of the Sixth Social Secu­rity Code). Should the judge­ment of the Göttingen Regional Court become legally binding, the professor who was sentenced last would have to be prepared for such conse­quences.

The other two offen­ders faced milder conse­quences. The professor of biology was only sentenced to six months proba­tion and is ther­e­fore allowed to continue working at the univer­sity. The judge­ment is not yet final.

The Professor of Forest Science and Forest Ecology, who had to answer to the Admi­nis­tra­tive Court, got off even lighter. His salary has been reduced by two levels and he now earns 2,000 euros less per month, while his civil servant status remains untouched — a judge­ment that, accor­ding to the press office, was received “with great surprise” by the Univer­sity of Göttingen.

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