A regional court in Vienna has convicted Daban K., an Iraqi Kurd immigrant, of murdering his partner – also an Iraqi migrant and mother of seven – after residing illegally in the central European country for many years. The jury sentenced the man to life in prison; however, the decision isn’t final.
Back in 2011, the Austrian government had revoked his residency permit due to his criminal record, but despite a number of criminal of offenses which culminated with the killing of his supposed fiancé, the man was never deported. The case has prompted intense debates about Austria’s asylum system.
The 40-year-old Iraqi Kurd finally admitted to stabbing 50-year-old Nagsha R. – the woman whose flat he lived in during the past few months and whom he supposedly had planned to marry – to death after denying he had previously denied doing so for some time, claiming that she had inflicted the stab wounds on herself.
According to the defendant, the stabbing happened after an argument with the woman. When interviewed, Daban K. stated that he had ‘loved this woman a lot’. Although following a wedding in accordance with religious laws last year, the woman supposedly no longer wished to have sex with the man. It was also reported that the two argued over the man’s hashish consumption and that he was insulted by it.
During court proceedings, the defendant told the court, “She insulted my manhood, she said I do not even have hair on my chest.” He also added that he had thrown the woman’s vibrator away because it was ‘dangerous’.
He also alleged that the woman had periodically received male guests and was unfaithful to him.
According to the Austrian outlet Heute, he told a psychiatrist, “She cheated on me three times with other men and did not want to sleep with me anymore, and, at some point, she said my penis was too small.”
Daban K. claimed that on the same day as the murder last fall an Iraqi man on the street waited for the women to give her 3,000 euros for plastic surgery. The man asserted that the brutal stabbing had simply been an act of ‘self-defense’ and that the woman had first threatened him with a knife, screaming, “I’m going to kill you because you’re not a man!”
Allegedly, he then took the knife from her and ‘saw all in black’ before he stabbed the woman repeatedly with what he said was ‘blind anger’. Supposedly, he couldn’t remember any other details about the crime.
According to a neighbor, he could hear the victim screaming ‘Save me, he wants to slaughter me!’ before he ran to the flat, opened the unlocked door, and saw Daban brutally stabbing her. Apparently, the stacked a table, armchair, and shawls over the woman’s lifeless body before he left the flat without showing any kind of agitation or emotion.
According to oe.24., after specifics of the gruesome murder surfaced publicly, many questions were raised about Austria’s asylum system.
It has been reported that the man’s asylum application was initially rejected in 2005, but he couldn’t be deported since he was ‘entitled to subsidiary protection’. After Daban K. was convicted of extortion in 2011, this status was withdrawn and he was ordered to leave Austria.
However, he failed to obey the government’s orders and even filed for asylum once more.
Later in 2016, Daban K. was reportedly sentenced to prison for drug trafficking, then, received nine additional months of imprisonment for causing bodily harm.
Ultimately, however, Daban K. evaded serving any time in jail after he was declared ‘unfit for detention’. The decision was initially rejected following a psychiatric report, but after he contested the decision in court he ended up walking free.
Again, in 2017, he applied for a residence permit but was denied. After filing another appeal, he simply remained in the country.
