Days into the sprawling trial over the collapse of Wirecard AG, the lawyer for the payment firm's former boss Markus Braun demanded a halt to proceedings, saying prosecutors must re-examine key parts of their case.
Piles of relevant documents were disclosed to the defense only four weeks before the trial started, robbing attorneys of a fair chance to prepare, Alfred Dierlamm, Braun's lead attorney, said in his opening statement on Monday. Prosecutors also failed to secure account statements of companies linked to the scandal and instead uncritically believed the "tall stories" of their central witness, he added.
"This is a distortion of a criminal justice," said Dierlamm, at the trial located in the Stadelheim prison, among Germany's largest prison complexes. "The case suffers from grave violations of the rule of law because information was withheld from the defense."
Braun and two other men are on trial over the 2020 demise of Wirecard, the digital payment company that collapsed over allegations it was built on fraud. After numerous denials, Wirecard finally admitted that more than $2 billion in cash it had previously reported as merely missing likely never existed. The company filed for insolvency a few days later in June 2020. The case became Germany's biggest corporate scandal.
A central part of the allegations is linked to so-called Third Party Acquirers, or TPA, which allegedly procured payment business for Wirecard. Prosecutors said in their charges that this business didn't exist and the paperwork surrounding it was forged.
These TPAs had accounts in Germany with assets totaling €1 billion, making it hard to believe there was no such business, Dierlamm said. About €750 million of that money was then sent to accounts of off-shore companies controlled by Oliver Bellenhaus, who is on trial alongside Braun and is also a key witness the prosecution relies on. Dierlamm said accounts of these companies should have been thoroughly checked instead of claiming that money has nothing to do with Wirecard.
"Only when these accounts have been thoroughly reviewed and when we know who profited here, we can say who the perpetrators were," said Dierlamm. "Follow the money!"
His client believed in Wirecard and bought shares for millions of euros as late as May 2020, which shows that he had nothing to do with the scam that brought it down, said Dierlamm.
The court didn't say when it would rule on Dierlamm's request.
Lawyers for Bellenhaus and Stephan von Erffa, Wirecard's former head of accounting who is also in trial, are scheduled to make their opening statements later on Monday.
