German thug probed over Cup brawl

Updated: Tuesday July 02, 2002 11:46 a.m. ET

BERLIN (Reuters) -- A German football hooligan convicted of savagely beating a French policeman at France 98 was involved in a brawl on Sunday after Germany lost to Brazil in the World Cup final, prosecutors said on Tuesday.

A spokeswoman for the state prosecutor's office in Hanover said Markus Warnecke, who was released from jail in France in April after serving four years of a five-year sentence, was under investigation.

"We can confirm that there was a fight and that Herr Warnecke was involved," said state prosecutor Jutta Rosendahl.

"The exact role he played still has to be determined. We are investigating charges of assault against a total of six suspects."

Warnecke, 31, went on a drunken rampage with other German hooligans in June 1998 after failing to obtain tickets to the Germany-Yugoslavia World Cup match in Lens, northern France.

Gendarme Daniel Nivel suffered permanent brain damage from the vicious attack and two other policemen were hurt.

Warnecke, a tattoo shop owner with links to the German far right, said during the trial he had hit a policeman during the attack but did not admit to battering Nivel.

GOOD BEHAVIOUR

Warnecke was released early from Longuenesse prison in northern France in April for good behaviour.

French police escorted him to the German border from where he was to return to his family near Hanover.

Warnecke's lawyer Bertrand Wambeke said the part-time bouncer would return to university in Germany.

Warnecke was sentenced in May last year but had already spent three years in custody.

In December, a court rejected a bid to free him, ruling he had not served long enough.

A German court sentenced four other men in 1999 to jail terms ranging from three-and-a-half to 10 years for the attack on Nivel.

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