The complex trafficking trial at the Traunstein regional court against four members of Syria’s Al-Sarawi network ended earlier than planned and, in some cases, with long prison sentences. The court sentenced the main defendant, the leader of an international clan, to twelve years in prison on Tuesday. Therefore, as a client, he was directly responsible for many smuggling cases, which were sometimes life-threatening – in one case fatal.
The court also believed that he ordered two murders of his ex-wife and her current husband, but the murders were no longer carried out after the group was exposed. Further alleged, non-fatal assassination attempts on his former father-in-law in Syria cannot be remotely cleared up beyond reasonable doubt by a court.
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Investigators have for some time now blamed Al-Sarawi’s extensive network for much of the smuggling from Syria via the so-called Balkan route to Europe. Prosecutors accused the four men, who were born in Syria and most recently lived in northern Germany and are now on trial in Traunstein, of smuggling several hundred people to Europe.
Two sisters were reportedly killed during a smuggling operation in the border area between Belarus and Latvia. One of them died of exhaustion in a clinic in Latvia, the other died in a forest in Belarus shortly after being repatriated from Latvia. However, the judge only saw one of the two deaths proven.
In the massive trial, which began in September and took place under tight security, the court also had to deal with numerous individual smuggling cases. The clan demands several thousand euros per person smuggled – with a guarantee of arrival in Europe.
One of the defendants handled payment transactions for the group in a manner called hawaladar. For this he received a two year suspended sentence. The judges praised him for the fact that he had provided accurate information about the informal payment system during the trial, that it could not be proven that he was directly involved in individual smuggling – and that he himself ultimately became a victim of his accomplices.
The main perpetrator and the other defendant, who had to be imprisoned for seven years and nine months, committed robbery with violence against him. The fourth defendant received a sentence of four years and nine months in prison for several sometimes life-threatening smuggling cases.
The starting point is a vehicle inspection in Samerberg in May 2022
The entire process was originally scheduled to take more than 20 days and could therefore last until shortly before Christmas. The court heard from dozens of witnesses, but three of the four defendants, aged 28 to 44, did not say much at first. But recently, all parties involved in the trial have agreed to a certain amount of punishment in exchange for a confession, which now saves the court much more time consuming trials and significantly shortens the process.
According to a court spokesperson, in his judgment the presiding judge unequivocally praised the “extraordinary” investigative work, which in this case not only led to individual traffickers, but also those behind the entire network. Based on previous information from public prosecutor Traunstein, the investigation extends to a total of 13 countries. The starting point was a vehicle check at the Samerberg stop on the A8 in May 2022, where Bavarian border police discovered three Syrians who had been smuggled into a BMW with Hanover license plates.
