The Reemtsma kidnapper Thomas Drach could soon be on trial again in Germany. On Tuesday, a court in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, wants to decide on Drach’s extradition.
Amsterdam – Reemtsma kidnapper Thomas Drach is on trial in Germany. An extradition request has been made. The German judiciary wants to bring the 60-year-old Drach to trial for three armed attacks on money transporters. On February 23, he was arrested in the Netherlands.
Former Reemtsma kidnapper caught for three robberies
Drach and accomplices are said to have perpetrated the raids on money transporters in Cologne and Frankfurt am Main in 2018 and 2019. The public prosecutor’s office in Cologne charges him, among other things, with serious joint robbery. Two money messengers were seriously injured by gunfire during the attack and the crime in Frankfurt.
In connection with two of the three acts of violence, an alleged accomplice Drachs was arrested in the Netherlands. In all three robberies, the perpetrators fled with cars stolen in the Netherlands with false license plates, set them on fire not far from the crime scenes and continued the escape with other vehicles.
After the robbery at Cologne / Bonn Airport, investigators found the murder weapon, an AK-47 Kalashnikov assault rifle, in the completely burned-out car. By evaluating the video recordings of the robbery at Cologne / Bonn Airport and subsequent partly undercover investigations, the prosecutors succeeded in identifying and confiscating an escape vehicle. Perhaps this helped the investigators break through.
Reemtsma kidnapping lasted 33 days
Drach’s name is inextricably linked with the kidnapping of the patron Reemtsma a quarter of a century ago – one of the most spectacular criminal cases in German post-war history. The kidnappers around Drach brought the heirs of the tobacco dynasty into their power on March 25, 1996 in front of his Hamburg villa and kept him chained for 33 days in the cellar of a country house near Bremen.
Because of the kidnapping of the patron Jan Philipp Reemtsma in 1996, Drach was sentenced in 2000 to 14 years and six months in prison. He was released in October 2013.
After his kidnapper Thomas Drach was arrested again, the Hamburg patron and sociologist Jan Philipp Reemtsma saw his prognosis confirmed. In the process of his kidnapping, as a joint plaintiff, he demanded preventive detention for Drach.
“It was clear that what he was doing was becoming more and more dangerous for other people,” said Reemtsma in an interview with the German press agency. “But it is not a great satisfaction to be proved right about such a thing.”
Reemtsma was kidnapped on March 25, 1996 on his property in Hamburg-Blankenese. On April 26, 1996 Reemtsma was released on payment of a ransom in the tens of millions *. Drach then went into hiding, not until 1998 that police arrested him in a luxury hotel in Argentina’s capital, Buenos Aires. After a long legal tug of war, Drach was extradited to Hamburg and brought to justice there. (afp / dpa) * Merkur.de is an offer from IPPEN.MEDIA
