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German Killers Sue Wikipedia To Remove Their Names

Posted by Soulskill on from the aim-for-foot-and-pull-trigger dept.

Jason Levine writes "Wolfgang Werlé and Manfred Lauber killed a German actor in 1990. Now that they are out of prison, German law states that they can't be referred to by name in relation to the killings. Therefore, they have sued to get Wikipedia to remove their names from the Wikipedia article about the killings. The German edition of Wikipedia has already complied, but the English edition is citing US freedom of speech and a lack of presence in Germany as reasons why they don't need to remove the name. In a bit of irony, their lawyer e-mailed the NY Times: 'In the spirit of this discussion, I trust that you will not mention my clients' names in your article.'"

11 of 859 comments (clear)

  1. Get your lawyers ready /. by Interoperable · · Score: 5, Funny

    You just referenced their names in relation to the killings.

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    So if this is the future...where's my jet pack?
    1. Re:Get your lawyers ready /. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny
      Consider the alternative...

      " In a bit of irony, their lawyer e-mailed the NY Times: 'In the spirit of this discussion, I trust that you will not mention my clients' names in your article.'"

      If a major media organization were to run a story about a long-forgotten 1990 murder, and that they weren't going to mention any names, they'd still get sued... by Glenn Beck.

      Catch-22. Tell the truth about a couple of convicted murderers and get sued by some German dude for naming names. Omit the names and get sued for libel by a guy who wears a Nazi costume on the front of his book. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

    2. Re:Get your lawyers ready /. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      No, but I'm pretty sure that now they are in prison someone else knows their assholes.

  2. Wolfgang Werlé & Manfred Lauber are murde by Charles+Dodgeson · · Score: 3, Funny

    Just so that we don't forget the names of Wolfgang Werlé & Manfred Lauber, convicted killers. I would like to mention that the names of the killers are Wolfgang Werlé & Manfred Lauber. If they, Wolfgang Werlé & Manfred Lauber, don't like it they (Wolfgang Werlé & Manfred Lauber ) can sue me.

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    Prime numbers are exactly what Alan Greenspan says they are -S. Minsky
  3. Cause and Effect by _Sprocket_ · · Score: 2, Funny

    Less Hasselhoff, more Streisand.

  4. Now that they are out of prison.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    They did get out of prison, but both where sentenced to life, so lets wait until they have completed there sentence, and then remove there names from Wikipedia. (but only if they ask nicely).

  5. Re:Wolfgang Werlé & Manfred Lauber are mu by bobdotorg · · Score: 3, Funny

    maybe time to register:

    wolfgangwerleandmanfredlaubermurderedayoungactorin1990.com

    Curious if you could register the .de counterpart.

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    __ Someday, but not this morning, I'll finally learn to use the preview button.
  6. Re:this is not a huge problem by earlymon · · Score: 3, Funny

    'Famous Actor Case Convict X' and 'Famous Actor Case Convict Y'

    I guess I can accept that with sufficiently large values of Wolfgang Werlé for X and sufficiently large values of Manfred Lauber for Y.

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    Pathological kinda promises Path + Logical - but instead, you get stuck with pathetic.
  7. Re:A proposal by Majik+Sheff · · Score: 3, Funny

    The Werlé-Lauber effect sounds like something physics students would have to memorize an equation for.

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    Women are like electronics: you don't know how damaged they are until you try to turn them on.
  8. Re:Capital Punishment by Sir_Lewk · · Score: 2, Funny

    I hereby demand that the names of all involved countries be removed from the WWII wikipedia article!

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    "linux is just DOS with a UNIX like syntax" -- Galactic Dominator (944134)
  9. Re:Ooh! Ooh! I wanna play too! by icannotthinkofaname · · Score: 3, Funny

    These gentlemen were declared perpetrators of a crime a few years ago, hence their sentence for a crime which shall be unspecified, yet the crime DID decrease the population by one, if that detail interests you.

    And what were the names of these gentlemen?

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    Let q be a radix > 1. I am in ur base-q, killing 10 d00ds.