Scholz's State Secretary in the focus of the public prosecutor's office: Investigations after raid in the Ministry of Finance

As part of the raid on the Ministry of Finance, the public prosecutor's office is now also investigating one of Olaf Scholz's state secretaries.

Berlin - After the search of the finance ministry, the Osnabrück public prosecutor's office is now also investigating the SPD politician Wolfgang Schmidt, who works as state secretary in the ministry led by chancellor candidate Olaf Scholz.

The

reported

on Tuesday afternoon with reference to the public prosecutor and the Lower Saxony Ministry of Justice.

Scholz State Secretary in the public prosecutor's office - court ruling published in part

The reason for initiating investigations against Schmidt is therefore a tweet from the State Secretary.

On Sunday, Schmidt wanted to point out differences between a press release by the Osnabrück public prosecutor's office and the court order to search the ministry in a tweet addressed to Scholz's competitor Armin Laschet.

Schmidt posted a picture on which the court order could be seen in part.

According to the public prosecutor's office, Schmidt, who is himself a fully qualified lawyer, has violated Section 353d of the Criminal Code, which concerns the “prohibited communication about court hearings”.

Accordingly, it is forbidden to make judicial documents public before they are tried in court.

Olaf Scholz: Laschet was tough on finance minister after the raid in the Triell

The public prosecutor's office in Osnabrück is currently investigating the suspicion of fraud against the money laundering unit "Financial Intelligence Unit" (FIU), which is subordinate to the Ministry of Finance. As part of the investigation, the Ministry of Finance was searched last week. It should be checked to what extent employees of the ministry were involved in the decisions of the FIU. However, there was no suspicion of a crime against Scholz or one of his employees.

CDU boss Armin Laschet had also used the incident in the second TV triall on Sunday to raise allegations against Scholz.

The finance minister rejected this on the grounds that the search only affected the FIU and not employees of his ministry.

However, it is not known whether Scholz had knowledge of his State Secretary's tweet before it was published.

Ministry of Finance: Investigation against State Secretary - "unprecedented in the recent past"

"The current effort to discredit a public prosecutor's investigation in Berlin back rooms or in social networks is unprecedented in the recent past," an employee of the Lower Saxony Ministry of Justice told Tagesspiegel when asked.