But they haven't caught the skinheads yet. Isn't it too soon to tell?
a) What happens in [village name] stays in [village name] mentality.
b) The Neonazis of Pretzien seem to be pretty organized. The article gives me the feeling that the mayor seems to have 'adapted'. Even though a large part of the Pretziners may still be decent people (there were witnesses and the festivities were stopped), the influence of the Nazis seems big enough to let the witnesses stay silent about the actual perpetrators.
To avoid Ossi-Bashing I should add that this is in no way typical for East German towns and villages. But the numbers are still alarming. And what's worse is that actually there is not much that can be done for those parts of East Germany that suffer from a mayor economic depression. Manual labor is moving out of Germany, as is Farming that isn't done by the large companies which are ruining the prices for the small farmers. Middle- and Low-scale firms are suffering and closing here, moving where work is cheaper, and the socialist government hasn't left the East much from the start. Taxation that may be reasonable in West Germany is preventing new business from being created, and that is in parts intended because the West doesn't want it's business to relocate. The rich, the young, the able are moving into the big cities and over into West Germany. Many villages are left to decay, many people there live from welfare and look into a future that's not including them. That is a major reason for the nationalist attitude there. You are looking at Germany's biggest globalisation losers.