An employee of a Munich pharmacy has been sentenced to three years in prison for more than 1,000 cases of false corona vaccination certificates. For an acquaintance of the woman who is also accused of having sold the vaccination certificates, the Munich I Regional Court imposed a four-year prison sentence on Friday, among other things for violations of the Infection Protection Act. The verdict is not yet legally binding.
The court found it proven that the duo had falsified vaccination certificates on a large scale for several months in 2021. The 37-year-old offered this for sale on the Darknet, and he is said to have earned more than 130,000 euros in total. The 53-year-old pharmacy worker and the 37-year-old had a brief affair in 2017 and then had a toxic relationship. The woman has repeatedly tried to secure the man's affection through financial favors.
The defendant is also convicted of fraud
According to the court, the fact that the pharmacy employee received a lower prison sentence than her accomplice was also due to her early confession. "That's how it should be," said the presiding judge in his verdict. The 37-year-old, on the other hand, acted with greater criminal energy and only benefited financially from the systematic counterfeiting.
The court also ordered the man to repay almost 100,000 euros from his earnings. According to the court, he had already falsified documents before the vaccination certificates were sold. Because he had obtained jobs as a media designer with forged references and certificates, the district court also convicted him of fraud.
Endangering the health of others with fakes
The married 53-year-old is said to have issued the first fake vaccination certificates free of charge for the man and his fiancé at the time. Subsequently, the duo jointly decided to falsify the vaccination certificates for commercial purposes. The two would have used a computer in the pharmacy where the woman was employed.
While the public prosecutor emphasized that the defendants, unlike “99 percent of all people”, ignored corona restrictions at the peak of the pandemic and endangered the health of others with their fakes, the 37-year-old’s defense attorney downplayed this danger. The lockdowns were disproportionate, the protection provided by the vaccination was questionable, and vaccinated people were also in hospitals with Corona, the lawyer said in her plea.
Like the 53-year-old's lawyer, she demanded a suspended sentence for her client on Friday. The public prosecutor's office, on the other hand, had pleaded for four years and ten months in prison for the 37-year-old and four years in prison for the pharmacist.
