Amal Clooney taking on Isis in German court

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[size=68][size=81]Amal Clooney’s next case takes on German woman accused of joining ISIS, enslaving young girl[/size][/size]



WITW STAFF
04.08.19

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HUMAN RIGHTS LAWYER AMAL CLOONEY ATTENDS A NEWS CONFERENCE ON MEDIA FREEDOM AS PART OF THE G7 FOREIGN MINISTERS' MEETING IN DINARD, FRANCE, APRIL 5, 2019. (REUTERS/STEPHANE MAHE)
A 27-year-old German citizen identified only as Jennifer W. will be tried on Tuesday on a number of charges related to terrorism in the Higher Regional Court of Munich.
According to the indictment, in August 2014 the defendant traveled from Germany to Iraq, where she became an active member of ISIS’s “morality police” (hisbah), responsible for enforcing the terror group’s strict rules on dress code, public behavior, and alcohol and tobacco consumption. She allegedly patrolled parks and public spaces in Fallujah and Mosul with a Kalashnikov assault rifle and an explosive vest.
In the summer of 2015, Jennifer W. and her husband “purchased” a 5-year-old Yazidi girl who was part of a group of prisoners of war. They are accused of enslaving the child and her mother, holding them captive at their home in Fallujah. According to prosecutors, they would chain the child outdoors as a form of punishment. On one of these occasions, the child died of exposure after being shackled outside on an extremely hot day.
Prominent human rights lawyer Amal Clooney, who was appointed as the British government’s special envoy on media freedom last week, is representing the girl’s mother in the proceedings, along with German attorneys Natalie von Wistinghausen and Wolfgang Bendler.
The defendant has been charged with membership in a foreign terrorist organization, murder, murder as a war crime and violations of the German War Weapons Control Act. She faces a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
This case is believed to be the first prosecution anywhere in the world for international crimes committed by ISIS militants against Yazidi victims. ISIS has waged an organized campaign of executions, enslavement, sexual violence, and forced recruitment of child soldiers, as well as the forcible displacement of an estimated 400,000 Yazidis from their homeland in Iraq. 
“Yazidi victims of genocide have waited far too long for their day in court,” said Clooney in a statement. “I am grateful to the German prosecutors who I have worked with for their commitment to holding ISIS members accountable for their crimes. And I hope that this will be the first of many trials that will finally bring ISIS to justice in line with international law.”
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ISIS Militant on Trial in Munich for Membership of a Foreign Terrorist Organization and War Crime of Murder of 5-Year-Old Yazidi Child
Tomorrow, 9 April 2019, the trial of Jennifer W, a 27-year-old German citizen, will begin in the Higher Regional Court of Munich. The defendant has been charged with membership of a foreign terrorist organisation (ISIS), murder, murder as a war crime and violations of the German War Weapons Control Act. If convicted, she faces a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
According to the indictment, the defendant left Germany in August 2014 and joined the command structure of ISIS in Iraq shortly thereafter. She is alleged to have been an active member of ISIS’ “morality police” (hisbah), responsible for enforcing ISIS’ strict rules on dress code, public behaviour and alcohol and tobacco consumption. She allegedly patrolled parks and public spaces in Fallujah and Mosul carrying weapons including a Kalashnikov assault rifle, a pistol and an explosive vest and dispensing punishment for violations of ISIS’ “moral code”. In the summer of 2015, the defendant and her husband “purchased” and enslaved a 5-year-old Yazidi girl who was part of a group of prisoners of war. They held the child and her mother as captives at their residence in Fallujah. At that residence, the child was chained outdoors as a punishment and murdered by being left to die in scorching temperatures. 
Amal Clooney, a barrister at Doughty Street Chambers, and German attorneys Natalie von Wistinghausen and Wolfgang Bendler represent the girl’s mother as her counsel in the proceedings. Information provided by their client indicates that the defendant engaged not only in murder as a war crime, but also in crimes against humanity, including murder, human trafficking, torture and deprivation of physical liberty. 
This case is believed to be the first prosecution anywhere in the world for international crimes committed by ISIS militants against Yazidi victims. From August 2014, the Yazidi community in Iraq and Syria was targeted by ISIS through an Press Release: Trial of ISIS Militant for War Crime of Murder of 5-Year-Old Yazidi Girl starts in Munichorganised campaign of executions, enslavement, sexual violence, and forced recruitment of child soldiers, as well as the forcible displacement of an estimated 400,000 Yazidis from their homeland in Iraq. These crimes have been recognised by the United Nations, the German Federal Court of Justice, and other national and international bodies as amounting to genocide. 
According to Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Nadia Murad, herself a survivor of enslavement and torture at the hands of ISIS militants: “this case is important for all Yazidi survivors. Every survivor I have met and spoken to is waiting for the same thing – for the perpetrators to be prosecuted for their crimes against Yazidis, including women and children. So this is a very big moment for me, and for the entire Yazidi community”.
According to Haider Elias, President of Yazda, a global Yazidi NGO whose documentation work in Iraq since 2015 was instrumental to this prosecution and the identification of the girl’s mother: “Our continuous commitment to the Yazidi community is finally paying off. This is a big first step of what we hope becomes a groundbreaking trial that will encourage other countries to prosecute their nationals. We would like to thank Germany and our legal team for their hard work. But we also believe more needs to be done to address the suffering of the Yazidis, especially women and children, and we ask that the thousands of ISIS fighters currently in detention also be held to account for their crimes”. 
According to victim’s counsel Amal Clooney: “Yazidi victims of genocide have waited far too long for their day in court. I am grateful to the German prosecutors who I have worked with for their commitment to holding ISIS members accountable for their crimes. And I hope that this will be the first of many trials that will finally bring ISIS to justice in line with international law”.
According to victim’s counsel Natalie von Wistinghausen: “It is an important task to ensure that the rights and the interests of our client are fully respected during the entire proceedings, consistent with all fair trial guarantees. Our client wants justice to be done, as well as the opportunity to give a full account of the suffering she and her daughter lived through”.
According to victim’s counsel Wolfgang Bendler: “The victim's counsel will ensure that, through this trial, the accused will be shown the full extent of the impact of her alleged crimes. We reject any attempt to instrumentalise this case as a politically or religiously motivated trial, as suggested in recent statements by supporters of ISIS, and of the defendant”.
Note to editors:  
Under German law, murder is a crime under the German Criminal Code and murder as a war crime is a crime under the Code of Crimes against International Law.  German law provides that victims of such grave crimes have rights as ‘private accessory prosecutors’ and can participate fully in the proceedings alongside the prosecution and defence. 
For a German version, please click [url=https://www.doughtystreet.co.uk/sites/default/files/media/document/2019.04.08 Presseerkla%CC%88rung.pdf]here[/url].

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[size=34]ISIS 'morality policewoman' who 'let chained-up Yazidi slave girl die of thirst in scorching Iraqi sun’ covers her face in German court where Amal Clooney will represent the victim's mother[/size]

• The woman, named as Jennifer Wenisch, 27, was a 'morality policewoman'
  
  
• Prosecutors say she and her husband purchased a Yazidi child and her mother 
  
  
• They reportedly kept the two women captive and treated them brutally 
  
  
• Wenisch is facing life in jail for war crimes, murder, and membership of ISIS 
  
  
• Celebrity lawyer Amal Clooney is representing the Yazidi girl's mother 
  
  

By GEORGE MARTIN FOR MAILONLINE
PUBLISHED: 06:41 EDT, 9 April 2019 | UPDATED: 10:11 EDT, 9 April 2019

     





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Jennifer Wenisch arrives with her lawyer Ali Aydin
A German woman who joined ISIS has gone on trial today accused of letting a five-year-old Yazidi 'slave' girl die of thirst.
Prominent human rights lawyer Amal Clooney is part of the team representing the dead girl's mother, but she is not expected to appear in the Munich trial on Tuesday.
The defendant, Jennifer Wenisch, 27, faces life in jail if found guilty of committing a war crime, murder, membership in a terrorist organisation and weapons offences.

The case against her is believed to be the first anywhere in the world for international crimes committed by ISIS jihadists against Yazidis. 
According to news weekly Der Spiegel, the defendant, herself the mother of a small girl, confessed while talking to an undercover FBI informant in a bugged car.
German prosecutors allege her ISIS husband had purchased the Yazidi child and her mother - a co-plaintiff in the trial - as household 'slaves' and held them captive while living in then occupied Mosul, Iraq, in 2015.
'After the girl fell ill and wet her mattress, the husband of the accused chained her up outside as punishment and let the child die an agonising death of thirst in the scorching heat,' prosecutors charge.
'The accused allowed her husband to do so and did nothing to save the girl.'
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The former ISIS 'morality policewoman' reportedly left school after the eighth grade, converted to Islam and travelled via Turkey and Syria to Iraq where she joined ISIS
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She was said to have roamed the city parks in ISIS-occupied Fallujah (pictured) and Mosul in Ira


Recruited in mid-2015 to an 'anti-vice squad' of the group's self-styled Hisba morality police, she patrolled city parks in ISIS-occupied Fallujah and Mosul.
Armed with an AK-47 assault rifle, a pistol and an explosives vest, her task was to ensure that women complied with IS behaviour and clothing regulations, said prosecutors.
In January 2016, months after the Yazidi child's death, Wenisch visited the German embassy in Ankara to apply for new identity papers.
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Her task was to ensure that women complied with ISIS behaviour and clothing regulations, prosecutors claim
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The Yazidi child's mother is being represented by celebrity lawyer Amal Clooney (pictured)
When she left the mission, she was arrested by Turkish security services and extradited several days later to Germany.
For lack of actionable evidence against her at the time, she was allowed to return to her home in the German state of Lower Saxony, but quickly sought to return to ISIS territory.
Der Spiegel reported that an FBI informant had posed as an accomplice who offered to take Wenisch back to the ISIS 'caliphate', and chatted with her in a bugged car while they drove through Germany.
Wenisch allegedly said that the death of the little girl had been 'hard-core even for the ISIS' and unjust because only God had the right to use fire as punishment.
Her husband had later been beaten as punishment by ISIS, she said.
Police followed close behind her vehicle for several hours and listened to a live audio feed as Wenisch spoke and then arrested her at a highway stop.
Clooney, the wife of Hollywood star George Clooney, has been involved in a campaign with Nobel Peace Prize winner Nadia Murad, a former ISIS sex slave, to have the crimes against the Yazidi minority be recognised as a 'genocide'. 
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German prosecutors allege her ISIS husband had purchased the Yazidi child and her mother - a co-plaintiff in the trial - as household 'slaves'

Horrible. Of the many cases Amal has taken on I sure hope she gets justice for this mother who lost her child.
Let’s hope that this is the first of many more ISIS members getting their day in court.

The accused woman is from a small town nearby where I live. I'd like to know where and how she was radicalized. But primarily I want to know how she was able to see this little girl die and not do anything to help her.
She left a safe place to bully people in another country and help a murderous regime. And now she begs for pardon, expects a fair trial (something the victims didn't get) and a mild sentence...

I can't imagine how the Yazidi woman mother must have felt and must still feel that she wasn't able to save her daughter...