German Court Fines Man €9,800 for Stealing €48 Worth of Sausages from Farm Shop
A court in the German state of Hesse fined a man €9,800 for taking sausages worth €48 from a farm shop without paying. The verdict is not yet final.
A district court in Eschwege, in northern Hesse, Germany, has found a man guilty of theft from a farm shop and fined him €9,800. The loss to the farm was €48, but the penalty is far higher because the man had previously been convicted of theft. The ruling is not yet legally binding.
What happened at the farm shop
The case goes back to November last year. The Hofladen Menthe farm shop operates on the Menthe family's farm in Meinhard-Grebendorf, in the Werra-Meißner district. It sells flour, potatoes, oils, eggs and other products. The man repeatedly took sausages and eggs without paying. The sausages were worth €48.
The farmer said the man helped himself on two days without paying. He was identified through his car's number plate, which was captured on video. After a criminal complaint was filed, the man returned to the shop to pay for his "purchase" after the fact, but the farmer refused to go along with it.
The court proceedings
At the Amtsgericht, the matter was fairly clear-cut. The defendant said he had shopped there for years and was shocked by the complaint, and he firmly denied the offences. At the same time, he conceded that he might not have paid for everything. The judge found him guilty.
According to the newspaper HNA, the judge added in his ruling that these were shops that still help keep farming alive.
