The suspect behind the bomb attack on Borussia Dortmund’s football team bus in 2017 has been sentenced to 14 years in jail. The defendant, identified as Sergej W. was convicted on 28 accounts of attempted murder by the Dortmund State court.
The 29-year old German citizen was also ordered to pay 15,000 euros to Marc Bartra, Dortmund’s defender who got injured in the attack and need an operation to remove debris from his hand. The bomb attack occurred on the 11th of April, 2017 when Dortmund was to host Monaco in the UCL.
With Borussia Dortmund being the only German club whose shares are listed on the stock exchange, prosecutors alleged that Sergej W took out a loan and placed a bet Dortmund’s shares would drop in value, to achieve his proposition, he bombed the team’s football bus and tried to disguise the attack as an Islamic terrorism.
Defence lawyers argued that W should be convicted only of setting off an explosion and be given a much lower sentence, which made the verdict fall short of the prosecutors’ call for a life sentence.
The verdict ends an 11-month trial that had testimony from players and Dortmund’s coach at the time, Thomas Tuchel.