The woman, who has not been publicly identified, told the court that she acted in self-defense and did not intend to aim her knife at the man's heart. She has been charged with causing bodily harm resulting in death and is being tried in a youth court. If convicted, she could face up to ten years in prison.
Prosecutors said the Eritrean man had walked away before the woman decided to follow him. "The public prosecutor's office does not believe that the stabbing was justified by self-defense," a spokesperson for the prosecutor's office told the Bild. However, prosecutors claimed to the court that the woman did not mean to kill him, but wanted to injure him. This is why she hasn't been charged with murder or manslaughter.
The American woman, who lives in Kaiserslautern, has maintained that she deployed the knife to keep the man at a distance in an act of self-defense. She turned herself into the police after the incident and has not been remanded to custody while awaiting trial.
