Overview
- In a December 30, 2025 ruling disclosed this week, the Karlsruhe Regional Court found the 2023 search warrants and provisional seizures tied to the linksunten.indymedia archive unlawful and disproportionate, with the state ordered to cover costs and no further appeal allowed.
- Police had seized nearly 200 electronic data carriers in August 2023, many of them encrypted, but investigators gained no usable findings and closed the case in May 2025 with the items returned.
- Judges questioned whether there was a sufficient initial suspicion of violating an association ban and noted the archive’s static nature did not indicate an ongoing group or new postings.
- The ruling follows a November 2025 Federal Constitutional Court decision that a search of a Radio Dreyeckland journalist over a link to the archive was unlawful.
- Despite the 2017 prohibition of linksunten.indymedia remaining in force, no convictions have resulted from related probes and courts have repeatedly found the existence of a banned association unproven.