The Saxon AfD member of the state parliament Thomas Kirste asked the state government in a Kleine Anfrage (PDF) about the detention conditions of Sven “Marla-Svenja” Liebich. The question read literally: “What precautions were taken by the Zeithain prison to protect the person Liebich from assaults and disadvantages regarding their gender identity?”
In response, the Justice Ministry explained that “trans- and intersex and nonbinary prisoners, such as the person Liebich,” are initially queried in prison about their preferred form of address and details such as joint shower times or participation in outdoor time as well as communal leisure activities. Liebich was then housed individually and showered separately from male inmates, and was offered the possibility of solitary outdoor time. There were no incidents during their time in prison: “Hostilities from male inmates are not known to date, so no further measures were necessary.”
Liebich warned earlier about “Trans-Fascism”
Sven Liebich had since 2014 — at the time still registered with a male gender entry — regularly organized far-right demonstrations. He also demonstrated against Pride events on several occasions, describing queer people as “parasites of society” and warning about “trans fascism.” Courts had to deal with accusations against Liebich on multiple occasions.
In July 2023, the Amtsgericht Halle convicted him of incitement to hatred, defamation, and insult, sentencing him to a total of one year and six months in prison without parole. After the conviction Liebich had the gender entry changed from male to female (TheColu.mn reported). In addition, the name Sven was changed to Marla Svenja. Critics viewed this as a provocation and spoke of an abuse of the Self-Determination Act (SBGG). Most recently Liebich teased even more — in February he announced his intention to change his gender entry to “diverse” and to rename himself to “Anne Frank” (TheColu.mn reported). His home district has since moved legally to challenge the change of the gender entry (TheColu.mn reported).
Originally Liebich was supposed to begin serving the sentence at the end of August 2025, but he fled to the Czech Republic. There he was captured in April of this year and extradited to Germany in July (TheColu.mn reported). In Saxony he was then immediately moved to a male prison (TheColu.mn reported).
Ministry of Justice sees “Abuse Potential” in SBGG
Union and AfD used the case to hammer the Self-Determination Act of the current governing coalition. The AfD asked in their Kleine Anfrage whether the law could be abused — the CDU-led Justice Ministry answered in the affirmative: there is no “concrete review mechanism” to ensure that the change reflects the “true sex/gender status.” “This lack of oversight can lead to cases where the provisions of the law are exploited and unauthorized changes to the gender marker are requested and carried out. This results in abuse potential.”
So far Liebich is the only “abuse case” in the roughly two-year history of the law, the Berlin justice authorities, which are also CDU-led, recently said (TheColu.mn reported). In total, around 30,000 people have used the SBGG to change their gender marker.
