A German member of ISIS was sentenced to nine years and three months in prison at the Koblenz Higher Regional Court on Wednesday. The 37-year-old woman was found guilty of membership in a terrorist organisation, crimes against humanity and aiding and abetting genocide, among other charges. The verdict is not yet legally binding.

Husband worked as an ISIS doctor

According to the Federal Prosecutor's Office, the accused Nadine K. became Islamist radicalised during her studies in North Rhine-Westphalia and met her future husband, a Syrian doctor, there. Both left for Syria in 2014 to join ISIS. In 2015, the couple moved to Mosul in Iraq. The husband treated mercenaries of the terrorist group as an " ISIS doctor", while his wife supported him by running the household and raising their two daughters together. In their house in Mosul, the couple took in single ISIS women and stored a large number of explosives and weapons, including hand grenades and Kalashnikovs. The couple regularly practised shooting with a pistol.

Yazidi woman abused as a slave

In 2016, her husband brought a then 22-year-old Yazidi woman into the house as a slave. The young woman had been abducted by ISIS two years earlier during the ISIS raid on the main Yazidi settlement area of Shengal (Sinjar) and had been made available to other ISIS members as a "household and sex slave", the prosecution said. She was forced to cook, clean and take care of the couple's children. The husband allegedly raped and beat her regularly. The accused enabled and encouraged the rapes. "She could have and should have done something," the judge said. The Yazidi woman was also allegedly forced to pray daily according to Islamic rites with the aim of destroying her own faith.

Captured by SDF while fleeing

In 2019, the family was captured by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) as they fled the last ISIS enclave of Baghouz in eastern Syria. The accused ended up in a reception camp with her daughters, while the husband ended up in prison. In a repatriation operation by the federal government, she was brought to Germany in March 2022 with nine other ISIS members and 27 children. The Federal Public Prosecutor had her and three other women arrested directly at Frankfurt airport. Since then, she has been in pre-trial detention. According to the Federal Prosecutor's Office, her two daughters are being cared for separately from the accused.

Judge: No distancing from ISIS

The judge described Nadine K. as an "intelligent and self-determined woman" who willingly joined the so-called ISIS. Accordingly, chat messages showed that she was a convinced supporter of the terrorist organisation. The court could not find any evidence that the accused had distanced herself from the group, the judge said. The once enslaved and repeatedly raped Yazidi woman still suffers from her victimisation today. She has since returned to live with her family in Shengal. She appeared as a joint plaintiff and key witness at the trial before the State Protection Senate of the Koblenz Higher Regional Court. She travelled from her home country to testify in court.