It is likely to be one of the most important hearings in the trial of Alexander Falk. The only witness on this rainy November day in Frankfurt am Main: Etem E., who is said to have blackmailed the Falk family for years and finally offered his information to the Hamburg State Criminal Police Office. Without him, Falk would not be in the dock and in detention for more than a year.
For Alexander Falk, heir to the largest German city map company and as a multi-millionaire once on place 83 of the list of the richest Germans, much is at stake. The 50-year-old is charged with incitement to murder and dangerous assault. He is said to have commissioned an intermediary with the killing of lawyer Wolfgang J. in 2009. This was injured on February 8, 2010 in Frankfurt-Harheim with a targeted shot in the left thigh.
"Mr. Falk was excited and angry"
Falk had ordered the murder of a friend Es in a steakhouse in Hamburg, claims Etem E. He was there because he was then the bodyguard of the acquaintance. "Mr. Falk was upset and angry and was seen to have been annoyed by someone hating someone." Falk had "pushed over" an envelope full of money and given concrete instructions that his friend should get a new mobile phone with which they could communicate in the future.
Also at another meeting of his acquaintances Etem E. wants to have been present. In the process, he then wrote "the perpetrators" and gave them 500-euro bills - a total of 50,000 euros, as a down payment. According to key witness Etam E. Falk had promised a total of 200,000 euros for the execution of the contract, but they did not want to pay after the attack on the lawyer.
"Falk did not want to pay because he did not get his way," claims the key witness. Falk had been dissatisfied because Wolfgang J. "only shot, but not killed" had been. Falk had sent the acquaintance a text message: "Your boys are no good." He should have better assigned someone else.
Accounting fraud and community fraud
Many years ago Falk had sold his company Ision Internet AG for 812 million euros to the British telecommunications company Energis. However, the company became insolvent and moved to court: Falk is said to have inflated the sales of the company with fake shops and sold them at an inflated price.
In May 2008, Falk was sentenced to four years imprisonment for attempted community fraud and accounting fraud. Wolfgang J., the Frankfurt lawyer, is said to have worked since 2003 on a civil lawsuit against Falk. In the course of which, according to the indictment, a civilian arrest warrant against Falk amounting to 30 million euros was issued and enforced by seizure measures into his assets: Falks all bank accounts, shares and luxury goods were confiscated. A motive for a contract murder?
"He set Falk up against me"
Etem E. says his acquaintance after the attack on Wolfgang J. had to advance the missing 150,000 euros for the commissioned offenders and Falk finally lured into the trap: In Istanbul, the acquaintance would have recorded with his brother a meeting with Falk to him with it to be able to blackmail.
Etem E. was inaugurated. When he was to throw the envelope into the mailbox with a CD of the recording at Falk, he secretly took it and copied it. When this arose, Etem E. feared trouble with his friend. "He incited Falk against me," says Etem E. in court, he was afraid.
This is the only reason Etem E. wants to ring the bell at home with Falk and intercept him while jogging on the Alster. From blackmail. If one believes Etem E., rather he was threatened - by Falk. The millionaire even wrote him a letter with the dubious advice: "Do not fool around, we're strong, you know that."
The key witness is now in the witness protection program
At that moment, Falk's defender Björn Gercke bursts the collar: "I've listened to the nonsense long enough!" There is a reasonable initial suspicion of a false statement, says Gercke. But the court continues the interrogation.
After the attack on the lawyer had investigators on the television program "Aktenzeichen XY ... unresolved" for a suspect searched. The victim's employer had offered a reward of 100,000 euros for clues that help clear up the crime.
Etem E. says in court, he got the 100,000 euros. He had seen no other solution than to go to the police. "I was in danger, I have no friends anymore." Meanwhile, Etem E. is in the witness protection program. His questioning will probably continue on the next day of the hearing.
It is to be expected that the defense will fill him up. Falk's lawyers are convinced that Etem E. is an "infamous liar and cheater". Etem E. had "made four different contradictory statements in four different interrogations," says Gercke.