German cannibal retried

FRANKFURT - A German cannibal was led handcuffed into court yesterday for a retrial to determine whether killing a man who wanted to be eaten amounts to murder.

Photographers' flashbulbs greeted the arrival in a packed Frankfurt court of Armin Meiwes, a computer repairman who had cut up and consumed a man he had met via the Internet.

Meiwes was first sentenced in January 2004 to 8-1/2 years for manslaughter, but the Supreme Court ruled last April that the verdict was too lenient and ordered a retrial.

The bizarre case of sexual fetishism and gory details of the crime have transfixed the public in Germany and beyond, while legal experts have puzzled over when a killing can be called murder if the victim wanted to die.

Prosecutor Marcus Koehler read out the indictment as 44-year-old Meiwes, in a suit, charcoal grey shirt and striped tie but by now out of handcuffs, sat back and listened.

Meiwes has admitted killing Berlin-based computer specialist Bernd-Juergen Brandes, 42, but had initially been spared a murder conviction and a possible life sentence because the victim had asked to be eaten.

Prosecutors argued that he should have been found guilty of murder as he had killed to satisfy perverted desires.

Defence counsel Harald Ermel has argued that Meiwes' sole motive was to meet the wishes of his victim and that his crime was only "killing on request", a form of illegal euthanasia that carries a maximum five-year sentence.

Prosecutor Koehler told the court Meiwes took Brandt to his half-timbered home in Rotenburg in central Germany from a nearby railway station on March 9, 2001, having agreed the plan over the Internet.

In a "slaughter room" fitted out with butcher's bench, meat hook and cage, Meiwes severed Brandt's penis and they both tried to eat it. Brandt tried to numb his senses by taking painkillers and half a bottle of schnapps.

"Due to the consistency of the penis, this did not succeed, either raw or fried," Koehler said.

Hours later, as Brandt fell unconscious through blood loss, Meiwes slit his throat and chopped off his head. The next day, he froze portions of his flesh, eating some 20 kg of it over following months.

"He (subsequently) watched the video of the killing of Brandt for his sexual pleasure," Koehler told the court.

Psychiatrists found Meiwes deeply disturbed but sane.

The court must examine Meiwes' motives and ask if they were sufficient to constitute murder. The higher court said the original court had ignored the fact that Meiwes had filmed the slaying for sexual gratification.

Meiwes' lawyers argue the defendant only killed Brandt because he wanted to die. Meiwes had earlier released four other potential victims who backed out at the last minute.

He even drove Brandt back to the station after the victim initially appeared to lose his nerve.

- REUTERS