Overview
- The Berlin public prosecutor filed formal indictments on Tuesday against four former Signa managers, moving the case closer to a possible criminal trial.
- A 50-year-old central suspect is accused of embezzlement (Untreue) in four counts for routing €10 million in purpose-bound loans via four transfers and failing to return over €8.4 million to the lending company.
- Three co-defendants, aged 45, 42 and 39, are charged with accessory roles: one is accused of controlling recipient accounts and two of coordinating and supervising two of the transfers.
- The Landeskriminalamt built the case by questioning many witnesses and analysing millions of emails plus bank, contract and accounting records; the main suspect was briefly detained in March and later released under strict reporting conditions.
- The Landgericht Berlin must now decide whether to admit the indictments to trial, with the prosecutions forming part of the wider legal fallout from Signa’s late-2023 collapse and following the Austrian OGH’s recent confirmation of a conviction for founder René Benko.