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Accused Abou-Chaker with defense lawyers (in August): motion to drop the case
Photo:
Pool / Getty Images
The visitor came uninvited and early in the morning.
Last Tuesday, officials from the tax investigation department and the Berlin State Criminal Police Office searched Arafat Abou-Chaker's villa in Kleinmachnow, Brandenburg, supported by a special task force.
The fact that the raid took place during the ongoing trial against the Berlin clan chief and three of his brothers may not have been the best idea - the public prosecutor admitted that this Wednesday before the Berlin regional court.
If the defense of Abou-Chaker has its way, the trial cannot continue.
Abou-Chaker's right to a fair trial has been irreparably violated, the lawyers complain.
You apply for the proceedings under Section 260 (3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure to be discontinued by judgment.
Since August, Arafat Abou-Chaker, 44, has had to answer to court for attempted serious predatory extortion, deprivation of liberty, dangerous bodily harm and other allegations.
He is said to have locked up, threatened and beaten the rapper Bushido.
According to defense attorney Martin Rubbert, the tax investigators from Abou-Chaker's villa took a file with "defense documents" and took photos of handwritten notes that the clan chief made during Bushido's testimony.
Arafat Abou-Chaker is said to have made the officials aware that they could not seize such documents as they were in his defense.
The investigators are said to have been unimpressed.
"I do have a bit of a stomachache here."
Martin Mrosk, presiding judge at the Berlin regional court
The chief public prosecutor calls it "very unfortunate" that the raid did not take place before the start of the main hearing, but rather during the trial.
The presiding judge is also unhappy.
"I do have a bit of a stomachache here," he notes.
The raid disrupts the court's plans.
Anis Ferchichi alias Bushido, 42, is a joint plaintiff and the most important witness in the trial.
On Wednesday he should actually continue his testimony.
For several days of the trial, he has been reporting in court how he met Arafat Abou-Chaker, what business they did together and how the separation ultimately came about.
On this day, however, Bushido does not have to talk about the past, but about the present.
How was that exactly on September 22, 2020, the day of the raid?
Why was his lawyer on the scene?
Why journalists?
And why did the tax investigators have a front door key for Bushido's villa, which is next to Abou-Chaker's villa on the same property?
Investigations are underway against Bushido for tax evasion.
He reports that he received an email from a tax investigation officer on September 10th.
The officer asked if they could look around his house in Kleinmachnow.
On September 14th, he brought his house key to the tax investigators.
He also told the officers that he had never lived in the villa.
The officers wanted to look around there anyway.
Bushido says he did not know exactly when to deploy.
He was also not informed that Abou-Chaker's villa was to be searched at the same time.
He found out about the raid "from the press" when it had already started.
He then called his lawyer and asked him to go to Kleinmachnow to be there when the tax investigators are in his house.
Bushido says he has nothing to hide from tax investigations
"If the tax investigation department asks, do you just give out your key?" Asks the associate judge.
"If the tax investigation department asks? Yes, definitely," says Bushido.
He has nothing to hide.
In addition, it is more pleasant when the officers come into the house with a key than when he has to pay for a new door afterwards.
The defense senses a plot and speaks of a "staging in front of the eyes of radio and television".
The tax investigation informed Bushido of an upcoming search, journalists were close to the start of the raid in Kleinmachnow.
Defender Hansgeorg Birkhoff suggests that none of this could be a coincidence.
"The question is," he says: "What is actually going on in the background of this process?"
"It is undisputed that we have to clear this up," says the presiding judge.
On the next day of the hearing, the court wants to hear a tax investigation officer.
A decision on the defense's motion to end the process is pending.
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