When defamatory messages and information are distributed over the Internet, the question always arises as to which court is responsible for making a decision and which national law should be applied in the proceedings. In other words: which regulations must be observed (German law? another foreign law?) and which court is responsible.
In its decision of October 4, 2023 (15 Ns 75/23 g), the Supreme Court most recently had to assess a case in which someone in a WhatsApp message to another person referred to a third person as a "lying baron". The recipient of this message lived in the local jurisdiction of the District Court of Baden, where the WhatsApp message was received according to the file.
The District Court of Baden initially referred the case to the District Court of Zell am See on the grounds that neither the crime scene nor the place where the result occurred was known.
The court also believed that it did not have jurisdiction and submitted the file to the Supreme Court. The file did not provide any indication of its local jurisdiction, which could in principle be based on the place of execution, but this was not evidently the case here. Therefore, the place where the result occurred, in the form of the place of residence of the recipient of the message, would be decisive and would therefore establish jurisdiction. That would therefore be Baden.
The Supreme Court agreed with this view. According to Section 36 Paragraph 3, first sentence of the Code of Criminal Procedure, the court in whose district the crime was committed is responsible for the main proceedings. If this place is abroad or cannot be determined, then in the case of crimes with a result, and slander under Section 111 Paragraph 1 of the Criminal Code is one such crime, the place where the result occurred or should have occurred is decisive. This place of occurrence of the result is to be defined when the WhatsApp message is received by the recipient and she lives in the local area of responsibility of the District Court of Baden. The Supreme Court therefore ordered that the proceedings be conducted before the District Court of Baden.
This very short decision shows impressively (the private prosecution was filed on April 5, 2023, the decision of the Supreme Court was made on October 4, 2023) that answering the question of the jurisdiction of courts can take an extremely long time. For this reason alone, legal advice is generally required so that proceedings can be shortened and the suffering of those involved can be reduced.