The trial of Dubliner Daniel Tatlow-Devally and four others, charged with entering and damaging an Israeli arms firm premises in Germany last September, was suspended almost before it began on Monday.
After a 90-minute delay, proceedings got under way with a heated 30-minute shouting match and a subsequent walkout by the 11 defence lawyers.
A high-security glass partition impeded contact with their clients, they said, and made a fair trial impossible.
The five defendants are charged with trespassing and causing an estimated €1 million in property damage to the German subsidiary of Israeli arms company Elbit Systems in Ulm. In addition they are accused of membership of a criminal organisation and use of symbols linked to Hamas, classified in Germany as a terrorist organisation.
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A demonstration in solidarity with Tatlow‑Devally and the so-called Ulm 5 took place outside the German embassy in Dublin on Monday to coincide with the beginning of court proceedings.
The five defendants have spent nearly eight months in pretrial detention with 23-hour lock-up. They were led into court on Monday in handcuffs and placed behind a glass security screen. They were greeted, from behind another security screen, with cheers and a four-minute standing ovation from about 60 family members and supporters in the public gallery. Many shouted “Free Palestine”.
Tatlow-Devally, a 32-year-old Trinity College graduate and Berlin resident, wore a blue button-down shirt and looked paler and with longer hair than in pre-detention pictures. He smiled and gave a peace sign to his mother, Mimi, and sister, Clara. The other defendants are two British citizens, Walter Tricks and Hannah Hailu; Spanish citizen Leandra Rollo Valenzuela; and German citizen Vivien Kovarbasic.
The stand-off revolved around the court’s insistence that the indictment was read out before hearing defence motions on how security and seating arrangements would impinge their work. Defence lawyer Benjamin Düsberg, representing Tatlow-Devally, complained of a “stigmatising effect” of keeping the defendants to the rear of their lawyers, behind a high glass wall.
The trial is being heard by three judges and two lay judges. Presiding judge Kathrin Eichstädt insisted that, in line with court proceedings in the state of Baden-Württemberg, motions could be filed after the indictment and before opening arguments.
“You do not have speaking rights at the moment and what you have to say is not part of the hearing,” she said to the defence team, cutting their microphones and rendering much of the debate inaudible.
Proceedings were suspended until next Monday. Defence lawyer Caroline Kaufmann told about 80 supporters outside the courtroom, many wearing keffiyeh scarves, that the judge had “made the trial impossible today”.
“It is essential for us to sit with our clients and for them not to sit isolated behind bulletproof glass,” she said.
Planning the defence has been complicated by non-consecutive hearing days until July, she added, making it difficult for defence lawyers to maintain their law practices 500km away in Berlin.
Mimi Tatlow-Golden said the court “treated the defence lawyers with what looked like contempt”.
“At one point it was like the judge was talking to kindergarten children in a way one did generations ago,” she added.
A court spokesman said Stuttgart’s higher regional court decided to move the hearing to the Stammheim high-security facility, outside the city centre, because of security considerations and to minimise expected disruption due to demonstrations.
“The glass partition is built in [to the courtroom] and therefore cannot be moved,” the spokesman said. “Furthermore, communication between the defence attorneys and the defendants is always possible via microphone.”
