The trial of Ernst Josef Lichtenstrasser, who admitted to having shot and killed two senior executives of the Namibian Institute of Mining and Technology in Arandis, will resume today in the Windhoek High Court.
Lichtenstrasser is being tried for the murders of NIMT’s executive director at the time Eckhardt Mueller, and his deputy Heinz Heimo Hellwig. The duo died in the morning hours of 15 April 2019 after allegedly being gunned down at the entrance of the NIMT offices at the Erongo mining town.
The accused further faces two charges of possessing a firearm without a licence, and another charge of possessing ammunition without a licence, defeating or obstructing the course of justice, theft, and the unauthorised supply of a firearm and ammunition.
In a confession, which Lichtenstrasser fought hard to keep out of evidence but failed, he admitted having killed Mueller and Hellwig by firing several shots at them at the entrance of the Arandis NIMT offices on 15 April 2019. He said he drove from his residence to Arandis the previous evening between 22h00 and 23h00, but realised that he was too early when he got there.
He then decided to drive into the desert for a few kilometres, where he kept popping strong painkillers with booze, and he hallucinated with voices in his head talking to him, asking him “is it worth it; is it worth it?” – and the other one saying Mueller deserved it – that he was his enemy, and that he is on a mission.
The next morning, he said, he drove to the NIMT campus and waited for Mueller and Hellwig.
When he saw their car approaching, he followed them and parked behind them.
He was still unsure of what to do at that stage, the accused said, but when “Henry” saw him and asked him what he was doing there, he took out the gun and went into training mode; it became automatic when Mueller said to him in German: “What are you doing here? Get lost”.
“That is when I lost it, and it became automatic; I had tunnel vision. I did not see people – I only saw shades, targets and then it was just pop, pop, pop, bam, bam, bam,” Lichtenstrasser said in the recording.
According to him, he thinks he shot Hellwig first because he thinks Hellwig threw himself in front of Mueller, but that Hellwig did not fall immediately, and he kept on firing. He said after the body shots, he went over and fired two more shots into the heads of Hellwig and Mueller.
“That is when your training comes in,” he said, adding that it is called the Mozambican drill: shots to the body and then two to the head. Lichtenstrasser further said he must have “exaggerated” with Mueller.
According to him, it was Mueller’s tone of voice that pushed him over the edge.
“That voice; the way he talked,” Lichtenstrasser said in the recording.
From there, he drove in the direction of Usakos and then went into the desert, where he buried the firearm he had used and some live projectiles he still had on him. From his directions, the police found parts of a gun, 18 live bullets and a holster buried under a rock in the desert near Arandis.
For his ongoing trial, Lichtenstrasser is represented by lawyer Albert Titus, while deputy prosecutor general Antonia Verhoef is prosecuting for the State.
Judge Christie Liebenberg is presiding.
– mamakali@nepc.com.na