Syrian asylum seeker Majd H. is awaiting trial for leading the brutal gang rape of an 18-year-old German girl in Freiburg in 2018 and despite being 22 he is being tried as a juvenile in the case.

The reason for the case taking place in juvenile court, rather than an adult court, is due to claims that the 22-year-old was under the age of 21 when the gang rape occurred. New reports also reveal that he is being charged with eight more crimes including the suspect rape of a 19-year-old in 2017 German tabloid BILD reports.

Majd H. who came to Germany in 2014 from Syria and is believed to have links to Kurdish militia groups, is said to have been the leader of the gang rape of a German teen alongside eight other men aged between 19 and 30 outside of a local nightclub over a period of around four hours.

The spokeswoman for the public prosecutor’s office Martina Wilke has revealed that Majd H. is currently being charged with a total of eight different crimes including another gang rape in a Freiburg apartment in September 2017 along with two other men aged 22 and 23-years-old.

Merkel’s Germany: Seven Syrians Arrested After 18-year-old Gang Raped https://t.co/HoZIInQnCB — Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) October 27, 2018

Between the period of April to August of 2018, the 22-year-old Syrian is accused of several crimes including several cases of dangerous bodily harm, assault, acquisition and trafficking of narcotics, attempted sexual assault, and acts of exhibitionism.

The gang-rape case caused widespread condemnation in Germany from various figures including populist Alternative for Germany co-chair Alice Weidel who reacted to the case saying, “The brutalisation of our country by these scum can no longer be endured!”

The case is the second major rape to involve asylum seekers and follows the rape and murder of student Maria Ladenburger in 2017 who was raped and strangled then left to drown in a river by Afghan asylum seeker Hussein Khavari.

Initially, Khavari too sought to claim he was underage, but tests, along with witness testimony from his own father, revealed that he had been an adult. Like Majd H. he had also been accused of crimes in the past including attempted murder of a girl in Greece before coming to Germany.