Arrest warrant against “lateral thinking” founder Ballweg lifted – SWR News

Lateral thinking founder Michael Ballweg has a good chance of being released from custody in Stuttgart-Stammheim after nine months. The Higher Regional Court (OLG) in Stuttgart lifted the arrest warrant against a condition on Tuesday. The Higher Regional Court justified the cancellation of the arrest warrant on the basis of proportionality. The punishment to be expected in the event of a conviction is lower, so there is no longer a risk of absconding.

Before Ballweg can leave the JVA Stammheim, he has to tell the district court of Stuttgart the address of two people who can reliably summon him at the beginning of the trial. The regional court in Stuttgart then has to release Ballweg from custody. The Higher Regional Court had previously carried out a regular detention review after nine months of pre-trial detention.

Start of process still unclear

Charges were brought against the founder of “lateral thinking 711” at the end of March. It is not yet clear when the regional court will hear the charges brought against Ballweg by the public prosecutor for attempted fraud, money laundering and tax crimes.

Ballweg has been in custody since June 29, 2022 on suspicion of money laundering and fraud. Since March 2020 he had organized protests against the measures taken by the federal and state governments against Corona, from April 2020 under the name “lateral thinking 711”.

allegation of attempted fraud

Michael Ballweg becomes one attempted fraud accused. Apparently, this is how it happened: Ballweg had spent a lot of money from his company and from his private assets for “lateral thinking 711”. That is said to have been more than 800,000 euros. When Ballweg ran out of money, he asked his supporters for help. They would have transferred him a total of more than one million euros. For a long time, the “Quermachen 711” website had the option of sending money via various cryptocurrencies and PayPal – the word “donation” should be used in the subject line of the campaigns and not “donation”.

According to the defense, 9,450 people transferred money to the “lateral thinking” founder. According to the public prosecutor, Ballweg then diverted at least half a million euros from this money to his private assets. From a legal point of view, it was attempted fraud, because the sponsors were led to believe that Ballweg had tried to get “lateral thinking 711” recognized as a non-profit organization. In addition, he had not tried to set up a charitable foundation or an association.

Many Ballweg supporters probably don’t see any fraud

A contentious question in the process will be whether damage has actually occurred. It may well be that a large number of those who transferred money to Ballweg see no problem (and therefore no damage) that Ballweg could have used the money privately. The sponsors wanted to support Ballweg as people with his cause, the defense argues. Is that cheating then?

Whether the donors have really been deceived is a tricky question from a legal point of view: Ultimately, however, what matters is whether the donors have actually been deceived, not whether they feel deceived or not. The court will probably also deal with the foundation set up by Ballweg, which is a family foundation and that it was founded in the administrative district of Darmstadt (i.e. in another federal state), where different foundation law applies.

allegation of money laundering

In addition, ball path money laundering accused – i.e. that he then withdrew the illegally acquired money in cash or converted it into other investments, such as cryptocurrencies – in order to conceal the origin of the money. In contrast to an amount in an account, the cash can then no longer be assigned where it came from.

allegation of tax evasion

The third charge is tax evasion. Because of tax secrecy, the public prosecutor’s office does not comment on this. The defense says, however, that there is an indictment here as well. Specifically, it is about the tax returns of the private individual Ballweg and his company for the year 2020, which were due in August 2022 but were not submitted on time. The defense argues that these declarations could not be submitted in time because Ballweg ended up in custody before the deadline.

What does the defense say about the allegations?

The legal team says there was never any fraud. This currently consists of three elected defenders (Member of the Landtag Reinhard Löffler, CDU, Alexander Christ from Berlin and Ralf Ludwig) and one public defender (Ralf Dalla Fini). Ballweg has demonstrably spent more than 800,000 euros on “Quermachen 711” and initially used payments from his sympathizers for it. In addition, he parked further money from the supporters in his private accounts (or in cryptocurrencies) in order to continue to spend it on “lateral thinking” in the future.

The defense attorneys believe that the public prosecutor’s office must prove in the process what Ballweg is said to have used the money for privately. The public prosecutor speaks of at least half a million euros, which Ballweg is said to have taken over in his private assets. The defenders also reject the allegation of money laundering. The money was not obtained illegally, so it is not money laundering.

Why so long in custody?

So far, the courts have always confirmed the risk of absconding in the Ballweg case. That’s why the detention lasted so long. According to the defense, the risk of absconding was justified by the sale of Ballweg’s house and the storage of his household items in a container at the port of Hamburg.

Stuttgart/Karlsruhe

The initiator of the “lateral thinking” movement, Michael Ballweg, failed with a constitutional complaint against his pre-trial detention. She was not admitted.

World trip instead of being sent abroad?

From the sale of the house and storage, the investigators apparently concluded that Ballweg wanted to go abroad, according to one of the defense attorneys. But that is not the case, the lawyer told SWR. Rather, the house was sold in the course of a divorce that has now been completed. The furniture was stored in northern Germany because Ballweg’s girlfriend lives there. Ballweg has also been planning a trip around the world for a long time. According to his lawyers, Ballweg never planned to move abroad permanently.

Defense: Ballweg is treated like a political prisoner

The defense claims Ballweg is being treated differently than other suspects. As an example, an allegedly sluggish or delayed correspondence is given, only hesitant access to files or a lack of legal hearing by Ballweg and his lawyers. The public prosecutor rejects these allegations. Courts up to the Federal Constitutional Court have repeatedly checked the handling of Ballweg and found no reason for complaint.