Daniela Klette

Last updated

Daniela Klette
Born
Daniela Marie Luise Klette

(1958-11-05) 5 November 1958 (age 66)
Karlsruhe, West Germany
Organization Red Army Faction

Daniela Marie Luise Klette (born 5 November 1958) is a German left-wing militant. She is a suspected former German terrorist associated with the third generation Red Army Faction (RAF). She went underground in the 1990s and was arrested in February 2024.

Contents

Early life

Daniela Marie Luise Klette was born on 5 November 1958 in Karlsruhe, West Germany. [1] [2]

Activism

Klette was active in left-wing groups from 1975 onward. These groups included the Anti-NATO movement and initiatives against the construction of Runway 18 West at Frankfurt Airport. [3]

Klette is an alleged member of the third generation Red Army Faction active during the 1980s and 1990s. [4] [5] [6] Klette is suspect in the 1991 United States embassy sniper attack in Bonn and the 1993 explosives attack against Weiterstadt prison under construction in the state of Hesse. [7]

In the 1990s, Klette went underground. [8] In 1999, Klette, Garweg, and Staub were suspected of robbing DM  1 million from an armoured vehicle in Duisburg. [9]

Referred to by the press as "RAF pensioners", [10] Staub, Garweg, and Klette are also associated with several robberies in the 2000s and 2010s: in Bochum-Wattenscheid (27 December 2006), Wolfsburg (28 December 2015), Cremlingen (25 June 2016) and Stuhr (6 June 2015). The German public prosecutor's office had been investigating the three since 2015 for attempted murder and various attempted and completed aggravated robberies between 1999 and 2016. [11] In 2016, three Germans matching their description were mistakenly arrested by Dutch police after renting a farmhouse near Medemblik in the north of the Netherlands. [12] The Bundeskriminalamt (Federal Criminal Police Office) put out a public appeal for information leading to her arrest, or that of accomplices Burkhard Garweg and Ernst-Volker Staub, offering a reward of €150,000. [2]

Police found her after a tip-off from the public in November 2023. [10]

As of February 2024 it was unclear how she managed to stay underground for 30 years. [10]

Arrest

On 26 February 2024, Klette was arrested in Berlin by LKA Niedersachsen and the Berlin Police without resistance. [4] She was charged with involvement in six armed robberies in which millions of euros were stolen, and at least one attempted murder. The crimes were alleged to have been committed between 1999 and 2016. Burkhard Garweg and Ernst-Volker Staub were also alleged to have been involved. [13] She was initially held in a prison in Vechta. [14]

Klette lived in Kreuzberg. She was believed to hold an Italian passport. She had a public Facebook account, to which she had uploaded photos of herself. [15]

Her photo as "Claudia Ivone" [16] in a capoeira club in Kreuzberg was possibly found by Khesrau Behroz  [ de ] and Bellingcat researcher [17] Michael Colborne, [18] [19] using the face biometrics software PimEyes [20] [19] for the Legion: Most Wanted podcast. [21] [22] The police are not permitted under German law to use face recognition software. [23]

The trial of Klette began on 25 March 2025 in Celle. It is intended to be moved to Verden after a riding arena there has been rebuilt, to meet authorities' demands regarding size and security that had not been met by the existing mid-level court ( Landgericht ) building. [14]

Investigation

Klette has made no statements about the allegations made against her or about the RAF comrades. [24]

Media coverage

The Lower Saxon authorities gave a live press conference announcing the arrest of the former terrorist, who had been wanted for 30 years. Lower Saxony's Interior Minister Daniela Behrens (SPD) spoke of a "milestone" in German crime history. [20]

Petra Terhoeven, a historian specialised in the impact of left-wing terrorism on German society, criticised the "hype" around the arrest of Klette and the coverage of the RAF in general, and also asked for the RAF not to be lionised and its victims to be respected. [25]

References

  1. ↑ "Daniela Marie Luise Klette". Open Sanctions. Archived from the original on 19 January 2022.
  2. 1 2 "Public appeal for information relating to the location of Daniela Klette" (PDF). Bundeskriminalamt. n.d. Archived from the original (PDF) on 14 February 2024.
  3. ↑ Alexander Straßner: Die dritte Generation der "Roten Armee Fraktion": Entstehung, Struktur, Funktionslogik und Zerfall einer terroristischen Organisation. Westdeutscher Verlag, Wiesbaden 2003, S. 108.
  4. 1 2 "A former member of Germany's Red Army Faction has been arrested after decades in hiding". AP News . 27 February 2024. Retrieved 27 February 2024.
  5. ↑ "Far-left RAF terror suspect Daniela Klette arrested". Deutsche Welle . 27 February 2024. Retrieved 27 February 2024.
  6. ↑ "German Red Army Faction trio wanted by Dutch police". The Guardian . Agence France-Presse. 26 July 2016.
  7. ↑ Alexander Straßner: Die dritte Generation der „Roten Armee Fraktion": Entstehung, Struktur, Funktionslogik und Zerfall einer terroristischen Organisation. Westdeutscher Verlag, Wiesbaden 2003, S. 142.
  8. ↑ deutschlandfunkkultur.de (20 January 2016). "Fahndung nach mutmaßlichen Terroristen - "Die dritte RAF-Generation ist komplett gescheitert"". Deutschlandfunk Kultur (in German). Retrieved 4 March 2024.
  9. ↑ Moncourt, A.; Smith, J. (2009). The Red Army Faction Volume 1: Projectiles for the people (ebook ed.). Montreal, Quebec: Kersplebedeb. ISBN   978-1-60486-029-0.
  10. 1 2 3 McGuinness, Damien (27 February 2024). "Daniela Klette: Alleged Red Army Faction member held after 30 years". BBC . Retrieved 4 March 2024.
  11. ↑ "BKA - Fahndungen RAF Übersicht - Fahndung nach KLETTE, Daniela".
  12. ↑ Cluskey, Peter (2 September 2016). "German tourists mistaken for notorious 1970s terror gang". Irish Times . Retrieved 27 February 2024.
  13. ↑ "One of Germany's most notorious criminals arrested after decades on the run". SBS News . 27 February 2024. Retrieved 28 February 2024.
  14. 1 2 Thurau, Jens (24 March 2025). "Daniela Klette: mutmaßliche RAF-Terroristin vor Gericht" [Daniela Klette: alleged RAF terrorist before court]. Deutsche Welle (in German). Retrieved 6 April 2025.
  15. ↑ Bordel, Anna; Wenzel, Simon (5 March 2024). "Was über die Suche nach den früheren RAF-Mitgliedern bislang bekannt ist" [What is known so far about the search for the former RAF members]. www.rbb24.de (in German). Retrieved 5 March 2024.
  16. ↑ Solomon, Erika; Schuetze, Christopher F. (2 March 2024). "How Facial ID Tools Found a 30-Year Fugitive: What Eluded Germany Hid in Plain Sight". The New York Times . Vol. 173, no. 66081. pp. A1, A7. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2 March 2024.
  17. ↑ ""Scheinbar hat Klette ganz normal ihr Leben gelebt"". Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg (in German). 28 February 2024. Retrieved 28 February 2024.
  18. ↑ Colborne, Michael (28 February 2024). ""Ich hätte lieber Neonazis gefunden"" ["I would have preferred to find neonazis"]. taz (Interview) (in German). Interviewed by Johanna Treblin. Retrieved 29 March 2025.
  19. 1 2 Colborne, Michael (28 February 2024). ""Ich empfehle euch dringend, diese Spur zu verfolgen"" ["I urgently recommend you to follow this lead"]. Die Zeit (Interview) (in German). Interviewed by Joscha F. Westerkamp. ISSN   0044-2070 . Retrieved 29 March 2025.
  20. 1 2 Klein, Oliver (29 February 2024). "Warum die Polizei Klette nicht eher aufspürte" [Why police didn't track down Klette earlier]. ZDF (in German). Retrieved 29 March 2025.
  21. ↑ Behroz, Khesrau [in German]. "Most Wanted: Wo ist RAF-Terroristin Daniela Klette? Monika (1/2)" [Most Wanted: Where is RAF terrorist Daniela Klette? Monika (1/2)](PDF). Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg (in German). Retrieved 29 February 2024.. In this episode Colborne is introduced to the listeners as a Bellingcat employee investigating far-right extremism and having expertise in face biometrics. Colborne matches face of the first suspect "Monika" to the face of Klette using the software by Amazon, and gives his opinion about the result that there is no match. Then it is said that using another software they have managed to find another suspect in Berlin.
  22. ↑ Behroz, Khesrau [in German]. "Most Wanted: Wo ist RAF-Terroristin Daniela Klette? Felizia (2/2)" [Most Wanted: Where is RAF terrorist Daniela Klette? Felicia (2/2)](PDF). Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg (in German). Retrieved 29 February 2024. In the episode Colborne describes the purpose of another biometric software which searches for images in the Internet having faces similar to a certain one, his use of the software, their discovery of dozens of photos of a female they nickname as "Felicia" in a Berlin capoiera club, his opinion about how much the face on the photos match the one on Klette's photo ("strongly suspect that these two individuals are the same person"), their analysis of photos on Facebook page of the club chairman, which was sharing photos and videos of the club's dance lessons there, presence of "Felicia" in some of them, and their visit to the club and observation of the photos of "Felicia" there too, and their interview to the club employee mentioning that "Felicia" has not been seen in the club for some years.
  23. ↑ Connolly, Kate (2 March 2024). "Daniela Klette: dog walker, dancer – and Germany's most-wanted woman". The Guardian . ISSN   0261-3077 . Retrieved 4 March 2024. The police are prohibited by strict privacy laws from using similar face comparison tools, instead relying on an artist's impression of how Klette might have looked aged 65.
  24. ↑ "Einsatz in Berlin-Kreuzberg: Waffen in Wohnung von Ex-RAF-Terroristin Klette gefunden – Granate entschärft". Der Spiegel (in German). 29 February 2024. ISSN   2195-1349 . Retrieved 6 March 2024.
  25. ↑ Übermedien (9 March 2024). "Verkulten Medien die RAF immer noch?". Übermedien (in German). Retrieved 13 March 2024.
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