© dpa
In the fight against organised crime, the Berlin Senate wants to launch a Federal Council initiative (Bundesratsinitiative) to better protect witnesses and employees of the justice system.
The black-red coalition has passed a corresponding bill. The aim is to create a new offence of coercion in the German Criminal Code.
«This is a clear legislative signal for better protection in the justice system,» explained Senator for Justice Felor Badenberg (CDU). The background to this is that witnesses to criminal offences are also repeatedly put under pressure in Berlin. The aim is to prevent incriminating information from coming to light in the first place - or to prevent an offence from being solved during the trial.
According to a survey by the Federal Criminal Police Office, there were a total of 20 real cases of intimidation of witnesses, public officials or experts in the course of criminal investigations and court proceedings nationwide from 2019 to 2022. However, Berlin's senator of justice assumes that the number of unreported cases is high. Badenberg has declared the fight against organised crime (OC), which often includes clan crime, to be a focus of her work.