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Police Testimony Continues in Scaled-Back Block Trial

Travel limits tied to the Middle East war keep Israel-based witnesses out of court.

Overview

  • The Hamburg court kept the focus on a local police witness and cut the day short because the evidence plan was thin, and later-week sessions were canceled.
  • Key interviews with suspects and witnesses based in Israel remain on hold because the war has blocked travel, so judges are filling time with Hamburg criminal police testimony.
  • Prosecutors say four Israelis and other helpers took a 10-year-old boy and a 13-year-old girl from their father’s home in Denmark on New Year’s Eve 2023, moved them to southern Germany, and the mother later brought them to Hamburg.
  • Christina Block, the daughter of Block House founder Eugen Block, denies ordering an abduction, and her partner, former TV presenter Gerhard Delling, also denies wrongdoing.
  • One Israeli defendant has confessed and is the only person in pre-trial custody, while defense lawyers pressed police on why they did not contact the mother or verify records early on, a dispute that could shape how the court weighs the early evidence.