Czech suspect says Romani victim must have stabbed himself to death

The Regional Court in Ústí nad Labem began hearing testimony on 20 January 2014 in the case of Stanislav Sýkora, who faces charges of racially motivated grievous bodily harm. Sýkora has testified that he is not guilty and that he believes the Romani victim caused his own injuries, of which he later died.

The incident occured on 24 May 2013 during the celebration of the opening of the spa season in Teplice. According to the prosecution, 31-year-old Sýkora attacked a 49-year-old Romani man with a knife who died as a result of his injuries.  

The state attorney said the victim was stabbed twice. The second blow was fatal because it pierced the left chamber of the victim’s heart.

The victim died while being transported to hospital. "It had to have been obvious to the defendant that, given the way in which he performed the assault, grievous bodily harm or even death might result," the state prosecutor said when reading out the charges against Sýkora.

The same knife was also used to assault two other men during the incident, one of whom was stabbed in the chest, the other in the arm and ear. The injuries caused in those cases, however, were not serious. 

"I regret what happened. I didn’t attack anyone, I was just defending myself, I was afraid," Sýkora testified.

A friend of Sýkora’s who ran the sausage stand where he was working apparently called to him for help, claiming that the Romani men had stolen something from him and assaulted him. They chased the Romani men and caught up with them several hundred meters from the stand.  

Sýkora also rejected the charge that he had racially abused the Romani men, alleging that they racially abused him. Eyewitness testimonies say that racist abuse against the Roma was heard during the incident. 

"You black swine, we’ll beat you up and settle our scores with you next time. Black swine, you fags," Judge Roman Felzmann read from the court record of eyewitness testimonies. 

Sýkora said he did not use those insults. He claims to have stood still, to have done nothing, and to have been assaulted by the Romani men, receiving several blows from them with a stick.

"I don’t know what happened, I don’t even know that I stabbed someone. I just opened the knife once," Sýkora testified.  

Sýkora was unable to explain how the three Romani men came by their stab wounds. "The way everyone was carrying on they probably did it to themselves," he said.

Another worker at the same stand who had been selling beer and sausages during the celebration also testified to the court today. His testimony refuted the allegations by the other sausage stand worker that the victims had committed theft. 

"No sausage was stolen," he told the court. Judge Felzmann confronted him with the opposing testimony from the man in charge of the stand, but the witness once again 100 % ruled out that any theft had taken place.

This tesimony contravenes the initial reports by the mainstream media over how the conflict began. Those reports were broadcast nationwide and turned the victim of this fatal assault into a thief in the public eye. 

Sýkora has been sentenced three times prior to this, among other things for driving under the influence of alcohol, failure to pay child support, and violent activity. He now faces up to 16 years in prison.

Relatives of the deceased, as well as the other victims have joined the case and are seeking compensation for damages. The main hearing in the case is scheduled to take four days.