A German court has jailed five members of an extremist group linked to the Reichsbürger (Reich Citizens) movement for plotting a coup and to kidnap the health minister.
The defendants, four men, aged 46 to 58, and a 77-year-old woman, who belonged to the self-styled “United Patriots” group, were sentenced to between five years and nine months and eight years’ jail by the Koblenz higher regional court on Thursday.
A fifth defendant received a sentence of two years and 10 months, the German news agency dpa reported.
It was one of several trials targeting the wider far-right movement, whose members adhere to conspiracy theories and reject the legitimacy of the modern German state.
Together they had hatched a plan to kidnap the health minister, Karl Lauterbach, a figure of scorn for many opponents of Covid-era restrictions, and to kill his bodyguards if necessary.
After the verdict, Lauterbach, of the centre-left Social Democrats, thanked “the police and the judiciary for solving and punishing the planned crime”.
The court heard that the plotters had joined forces by January 2022, planning to create conditions for civil war in Germany through violence and take over state power. Their scheme had included sabotaging and disabling the power grid, an operation they named “Silent Night”.
They hoped that in the ensuing chaos they would be joined by disgruntled members of the security forces.
Adherents of the Reichsbürger movement claim the German empire, which collapsed in 1918, still exists.
Other cases have been launched by courts in Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Munich and Stuttgart. Some have led to convictions, while others are continuing.
The eclectic movement of malcontents and gun enthusiasts was led by a minor aristocrat and businessman, Heinrich XIII Prince Reuss.
The alleged putschists are said to have taken inspiration from the global QAnon movement.
The Koblenz court also found two of the main defendants guilty of weapons offences and one of planning a serious act of violence endangering the state.
The men were arrested in April 2022 and the woman in October that year. The trial began in May 2023.
Last April, German prosecutors said they had charged a sixth suspect in the kidnap plot.
Nancy Faeser, the interior minister, said: “The investigations into this terrorist group have revealed an abyss. The violent plans for a coup, for attacks on the electricity infrastructure, for the kidnapping of health minister Karl Lauterbach and for the killing of his bodyguards have shown an enormous threat.”
She said security services took “threats posed by the Citizens of the Reich scene seriously and are acting accordingly. We are protecting our democracy”.
