German Reichsbürger member kills special forces officer in raid

Authorities admitted that the man, a hunter, had a valid permit for his weapons but maintain that he had since been deemed “unfit” to possess them.

The officer’s death was prematurely announced late on Wednesday. He eventually died of his injuries on Thursday, and the police confirmed the officer’s death soon after. Another policeman is being treated for serious gunshot wounds, while two others were lightly wounded.

The suspect opened fire before he was later detained.

Local authorities had called in police re-enforcements after the man repeatedly “refused to co-operate” with them, they say. When a special forces team moved in early on Wednesday the man began shooting through his door, according to the police.

Four policemen were wounded as they tried to arrest the suspect in the Bavarian town of Georgensgmuend, south of Nuremberg.

The Reichsbuerger [Reich Citizens] do not recognise the authority of the post-war German federal republic. They maintain that Germany is an administrative construct still occupied by Western powers.

Multiple attempts to prosecute the movement’s now-deceased founder, Wolfgang Gerhard Günter Ebel for impersonating a public servant and so forth had failed because, according to German prosecutors, all courts had found him to be legally insane.

“Germany rests on the 2nd Reich” and on the constitution of the Weimar Republic created on August 11, 1919, Ebel told AFP before his death. Technically some legal experts have agreed with some of Ebel’s theories.

“The German government is illegal,” Ebel told AFP, “and what they do has no basis in law.” Asked how it could be that the German people are unaware of this situation, Ebel said: “The German media is still under the control of the Allies. The entire media is controlled. Because there is no formal peace treaty between Germany and the Allies, headed by the United States, German sovereignty is compromised.

“The Second World War has not ended, because a peace treaty has not been signed between Germany and the Allies,” Ebel said, “The peace contract is the most important thing that we need and want.”

US occupation laws handed down by the Supreme Headquarter Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF) are still in effect, according to Ebel. Allied authorities had informed him that these SHAEF laws will remain in effect for 60 years from the date of signing and apply to all of Europe.

In 1987, the Allies requested that Ebel submit a copy of the 1919 original Weimar constitution of the German Reich, which he did. This is the only legal constitution for Germany, according to Ebel, until a peace treaty is signed.

Bavarian officials said the group’s ideology was “nationalist and anti-Semitic…. clearly extreme right”. Their circle had grown in recently years, they said, and included “whingers, nutcases, conspiracy theorists, but also the far-right”.

A district court judge in Saxony-Anhalt has described them as “conspiracy theorists” and “malcontents.”

Because of the diversity of beliefs and views within the group, there is no simple hierarchical structure or clear leadership.

Bavarian Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann said the group should not be dismissed simply as an “association of crackpots”. Some of its members were obviously capable of either resisting, or targeting representatives of the German state, he warned. Hermann announced that he will closely monitor Reichsbürger in the future.

The Reichsbürger are mainly found in the states of Brandenburg, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Bavaria, where many refuse to pay taxes or creditors.

They have their own small “national territories,” which they call the “Second German Empire,” the “Free State of Prussia” or the “Principality of Germania” for which they print passports and driver’s licenses for their supposed states.

State Offices for the Protection of the Constitution estimate that there are a few hundred Reichsbürger in Germany, but in Brandenburg there are 150 to 200 members alone. They are known to flood the court with motions and objections filed against orders and payment demands issued by local authorities.

Regardless of content, authorities are required to process every formally filed request they receive. While piling on senseless work for administrative officials to battle through, Reichsbürger also vocally confront and denounce state authorities.

In Bavaria, a group of Reichsbürger entered into a courtroom during a trial and stole documents from the judge’s bench. At Wittenburg city hall in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, administrative workers were given security training to deal with paper raids. All sharp instruments have since been removed from their desks and the building’s doors are now permanently locked.

Meanwhile Brandenburg has tested emergency call systems for its tax offices. The Brandenburg Institute for Local Community Advice has compiled a comprehensive guidebook for administrators seeking help on the issue and one of their suggestions is to ignore requests by Reichsbürger.

In Reuden, Saxony-Anhalt a Reichsbürger fired on security forces at his “State of Ur” property and police say they have found “large” caches of weapons and ammunition during the house searches of other members.

In Höxter, North Rhine-Westphalia a group called the “Free State of Prussia” was accused of setting up their own militia by smuggling in arms from outside the country, while a security company called the “German Police Aid Organization” in Meissen, Saxony is said to have links to the Reichsbürger.