5 years and 5 months in prison and 10 years of deportation for the Kosovar who blew up the ATM in Switzerland

The now 48-year-old Kosovar was convicted eight times in Switzerland between 1996 and 2006 and was banned from entering for five years in a 2011 trial.

He and his accomplices wanted to smuggle 110 kilograms of hashish from Kosovo to Switzerland via Albania and Italy, it reports. albinfo.chThe gang was caught red-handed by Albanian authorities and he was sentenced to four and a half years in prison.

Released again, he applied for entry into Switzerland in September 2016 to stay with his family living in Zurich.

He had concealed his previous conviction in Albania and had attached to the request a criminal extract that gave him a "clean" record from his country of birth, Kosovo.

According to the indictment, the responsible employees of the cantonal migration office either failed to notice the important documents or failed to read them.

The consequence: the person in question received the residence permit for which he applied only one day after receiving the request "without a closer or more in-depth examination of his information," albinfo.ch reports.

He is understood to have continued his criminal activity, writes 20minuten.ch. According to the indictment, he ran a covered cannabis plantation in Regensdorf with around a thousand plants in 2020 together with his brother and an accomplice.

In August 2021, he and an accomplice also unsuccessfully tried to blow up an ATM in Dietlikon.

The explosion of the gas mixture caused a firestorm ten meters in diameter and caused damage of almost 70,000 francs. The Kosovar was arrested six months later and has been in prison ever since.

In June 2023, the Bülach District Court sentenced him to an effective prison sentence of five years and four months and a deportation from the country for 14 years for the ATM explosion.

As for the domestic cannabis facility, he was found not guilty due to lack of evidence. Both parties appealed the decision, so the case went to the higher (Cantonal) court.

At the trial held on Friday, the 48-year-old said: “I am innocent.” Asked by the judge why he had not declared the sentence in Albania, he replied: “I thought the Migration Office knew this.” Regarding the DNA traces he found at the site of the ATM explosion, he said simply: “This is not my trace.”

His lawyer requested full acquittal, immediate release from prison, and compensation for the Kosovar.

According to him, the DNA report has formal and substantive deficiencies. It could also be a foreign transmission from a male family member.

This was opposed by the public prosecutor. “The expertise is consistent.” He requested a sentence of six years and one month in prison, albinfo.ch reports. The prosecutor said of the author: “His life is characterized by crime.” He secretly entered Switzerland with false information, so he should be expelled from the country for 14 years.

As announced on Tuesday by the Zurich Higher Court, it has sentenced the defendant to an effective prison sentence of 5.5 years and deportation from the country for ten years. This is stated in the written verdict.

The verdict is not yet final and can be appealed to the Federal Court.