German Politician Sentenced for Attacking Kenyan Business Woman

Patrick Gentsch
Patrick Gentsch, NPD politician and elected member of the Meeraner Stadtrat (Meeran City Council) and the Zwickauer Kreistag (Zwickau District Council)

A local German politician in Zwickau will be spending the next four months behind bars for attacking a Kenyan in what is believed to have been a racial attack.

The National Democratic Party of Germany (Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands, NPD) politician in Zwickau, Patrick Gentsch had been accussed of assaulting and insulting Mary Hänel, a Kenyan-German business woman, using racial slurs on the night of 20th December 2014 at a party in a disco in Glauchau. (Read:Kenyan Involved in a Racial Attack in Schneeberg) Mary is a well known business woman in Schneeberg and holds a stand at the Christmas Market annually, last year she made it to the media for selling crocodile stew at her stand. (Read: Kenyan Serving Exotic Meals at the Christmas Market in Schneeberg)

During the court proceeding, both agreed that there was a squable that night, but that’s the only part they agreed on. According to Gentsch, he tried to find out where Mary originally came from so as to find out if she lived in the local Asylum home, only for Mary to turn violent and slap him. Gentsch then retaliated and pushed her away, “so she could sit down,” Gentsch told the court.

Mary on the other hand told the court, she had felt threatened by Gentsch. “He kept making funny comments”, Mary testified.  Scared by his advances, she had refused to talk to him and had walked away. Later on when she went to the dancefloor to dance on her own, Gentsch followed her. He pushed her to the ground. Angered by the attack, she scrambled to her feet to confront him. Then Gentsch slapped her in the face. She tried to fight back, but did not manage to hit him right. “You have to really fight back,” she says. A witness who was at the party that night and testified in court supported Mary’s version of the story.

However, this wasn’t the end, as Gentsch continued to follow Mary around the whole night. Words like “Negersclampe” (negro bitch) and “Affe” (monkey/ape) were later heard being thrown around. This bit of information, including Gentsch’s history of violence, formed Judge Anita Gößwald’s ruling at the District Court of Meerane/Hohenstein-Ernstthal. Gentsch’s posture standing at close to 2 meters and weighing 112kg also didn’t support his defence that the petite Kenyan standing at 1.62meters and weighing only 50kgs attacked him.

The court sentenced him to four months imprisonment for assault and insult. In addition to this, Gentsch must pay 600 euros to a charitable organization. The ruling is however, not yet final. The recently re-elected NPD district chief may keep his mandates in Meeraner city council and district council in Zwickau. He would have lost both positions only if he got a prison sentence of over one year.

The National Democratic Party of Germany (Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands, NPD), is a far-right political party in Germany. The party is usually described as a neo-Nazi organization, and has been referred to as “the most significant neo-Nazi party to emerge after 1945”.

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