Karlsruhe (dpa / lsw) – According to a ruling by the Karlsruhe Higher Regional Court (OLG), demonstrators are not allowed to disguise themselves in order to remain undetected by political opponents. The Higher Regional Court announced on Thursday that the ban on masking is intended to counteract even abstract dangers at meetings. “Masked people are regularly the core of the violent perpetrators at a demonstration and can encourage those demonstrators who tend to use violence anyway in their willingness to use violence.”
The second criminal senate therefore, in accordance with decisions of other higher regional courts, rejected a restriction of the ban on masking in its judgment at the end of June (Az. 2 Rv 34 Ss 789/21). Anyone who covers their own face is liable to prosecution for violating the ban on masking.
Some regional and district courts saw things differently, the statement said. The Senate pointed out that the Assembly Act allows the Assembly Authority to exempt someone from the ban on face masks in justified cases.
In the specific case, a 41-year-old defendant stated that he was afraid of being photographed or filmed in the immediate vicinity by participants in an AfD elevator. The Freiburg district court acquitted the man, and the public prosecutor appealed. The Higher Regional Court has now referred the matter back to another chamber of the Regional Court for a new hearing.
