Criminalizing male circumcision? Case Note: Landgericht Cologne, Judgment of 7 May 2012 No. 151 Ns 169/11

On Thursday 19th of July 2012, just prior to the parliamentary summer holidays, the Deutscher Bundestag (German Parliament) passed a resolution based on a rather irritating motivation. The parliament intended to guarantee that “Jewish and Muslim religious life will be further possible in Germany.” The resolution itself consisted in only one sentence: The German Government is requested to provide until fall 2012 – in due consideration of the constitutionally protected legal positions of the well-being of the child, the right to bodily integrity, the right to religious freedom and the parental rights in education – draft legislation in order to safeguard that professionally performed male circumcision, without unnecessary pain, is generally lawful under German law. What had happened to provoke such extraordinary political action in defense of religious freedom? The resolution responds directly to a decision of the Landgericht (Court of Appeal) Cologne from 7 May 2012 which declared that male circumcision in children amounts to criminal battery, even if performed lege artis and with the consent of the parents unless there is a medical indication for the procedure. In doing so, the court followed a restrictive position within the German criminal law literature that has been advocating the criminalization of male.