Murderers Wolfgang Werlé and Manfred Lauber in the news*

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Murderers Wolfgang Werlé and Manfred Lauber in the news*

Sunday, November 15th, 2009 | True Crime |

“Wolfgang Werlé and Manfred Lauber killed a German actor in 1990. Now that they are out of prison, German law states that they can’t be referred to by name in relation to the killings. Therefore, they have sued to get Wikipedia to remove their names from the Wikipedia article about the killings. The German edition of Wikipedia has already complied, but the English edition is citing US freedom of speech and a lack of presence in Germany as reasons why they don’t need to remove the name. In a bit of irony, their lawyer e-mailed the NY Times: ‘In the spirit of this discussion, I trust that you will not mention my clients’ names in your article.’”

* Notice what I did there?

Tags: wikipedia

3 Comments to Murderers Wolfgang Werlé and Manfred Lauber in the news*

pdb
November 15, 2009

Ok, this kicked over my giggle bucket.

Les Jones
November 15, 2009

Man, how much does it suck for freedom of the press in Germany? They’re not allowed to make factual statements about public records.

steph881
November 17, 2009

I feel that Wikipedia has taken the appropriate actions by deleting their names from the German language and allowing the english version to remain what it is. Wikipedia is in fact protected by the first admendment and their criminal record shouldnt be cleared. they commited the crime and did the time, that doesnt exactly mean they can go about living their lives as if the crime never happened…