An alleged hate-crime murder motivated by anti-LGBTQ hostility in Langenzersdorf, Lower Austria, about a 30-minute drive from Vienna, is sending shockwaves through the queer community. The 29-year-old victim, Akhil Victor G., was killed in the night of August 6 in a single-family home with severe blunt-force violence. The 18-year-old suspect, H. P., a Hungarian citizen and martial artist, is currently held in investigative custody at the Korneuburg penal institution.
According to findings from the Lower Austrian State Criminal Police Office, the 18-year-old had been contacting the later victim for days through networks such as Snapchat and eventually lured him to a supposed date in the neighboring house, which he had been watching over while the residents were away on holiday. The two men did not know each other prior to the incident. On site, the suspect beat and strangled the 29-year-old to death. During police questioning, the suspect offered a cold-blooded confession and did not conceal his motive: “I hate homosexuals.” He said he had deliberately laid a trap to kill the victim.
Investigators are examining whether the perpetrator has connections to the so-called “Homo- and Pedo-Hunter” scene—a right-wing current in Austria that targets gay and bisexual men on dating platforms and attacks them under the pretext of child protection, a topic que er.de has reported on.
Defense relies on intoxication state
Shortly after the crime and the confession, the renowned Vienna-based defense attorney Astrid Wagner took over the representation of the 18-year-old. Wagner is known for, among other cases, having defended Josef Fritzl, who imprisoned his daughter in an underground cellar for 24 years. Her emphasis has shifted toward the question of possible insanity or lack of culpability at the time of the act.
According to the defense, the suspect was under a heavy influence of the synthetic drug MDMA (Ecstasy) during the killing. They argue that the drug intoxication could have impaired his control and culpability. It is also possible that the suspected perpetrator ingested the drug together with the victim, allegedly to enhance sexual arousal, and then unleashed his killing plan in a moment of uninhibited behavior. The prosecution has, in the meantime, ordered a psychiatric assessment to evaluate the mental state and the defendant’s responsibility, and has also requested a toxicological analysis of blood and urine.
If an expert examination rules out the ability to understand or steer one’s actions due to a profound state of consciousness disturbance (e.g., extreme drug intoxication) at the time of the crime, the individual would be deemed not responsible under Austrian law, specifically under §11 of the Austrian Penal Code. In practice, this could, depending on the threat the person represents, lead to placement in a forensic-therapeutic center rather than a regular prison sentence. Homophobic motives are generally considered aggravating factors in Austrian sentencing, but only if culpability exists.
