According to a decision by the Osnabrück Regional Court, anyone who illegally obtains a digital vaccination certificate by presenting a forged Corona vaccination card in a pharmacy is not liable to prosecution.
According to the current legal situation, there is a “criminal liability gap” for this case, the Lower Saxony court said on Thursday. The use of a false health certificate “in the private sphere” is currently exempt from punishment.
According to this, only the production of falsified health certificates and their use against authorities or insurance companies, which a pharmacy is not concerned with, are criminally sanctioned. Recourse to the more general criminal law regulations on forgery of documents is not possible for legal reasons, because there is a case of a so-called blocking effect.
Public prosecutors lodged a complaint
Furthermore, the German Infection Protection Act only provides for penalties in the event that specialists such as doctors who are entitled to vaccinations issue a false certificate, the court emphasized. As a result, the presentation of a false vaccination card in a pharmacy remains unpunished according to the current legal situation.
Specifically, the judges ruled on the admissibility of a seizure of the forged vaccination card by the police in a case from the municipality of Nordhorn. The Osnabrück District Court had rejected the judicial confirmation of the seizure with reference to the current legal situation, whereas the public prosecutor’s office lodged a complaint with the Regional Court.
The Swiss tried to swindle their certificates
At the same time, the court made it clear that a forged vaccination card could be confiscated by the police. The measure can be based on the police law to avert danger, because the use represents a “current danger to the general public” due to the risk of infection. This applies regardless of the question of whether the trade in question is criminal.
In September, several Swiss people tried to swindle a vaccination certificate in pharmacies in Konstanz (D). The fraud, however, was exposed. They are being investigated for forgery of documents. (AFP / jmh)