The well-known child photographer Achim Lippoth is said to have sexualized violence against several of his underage models. In the coming week he will have to defend himself before the district court of Cologne, like that time-Magazinein reported. Lippoth has been in custody for more than nine months. The 54-year-old had an international reputation as a freelance fashion and advertising photographer and photographed for almost all major media such as New York Timesthe Voguethe mirrorthe time and also the Southgerman newspaper as well as for numerous fashion brands. For decades he is said to have passed on several of his young models, as the time reported with reference to numerous witnesses. Lippoth is said to have been in a relationship with the mothers of his last two victims.
The district court of Cologne confirms that an abuse trial will begin next Tuesday, but without naming the accused. The indictment relates to 17 acts allegedly committed between 1999 and June 2021: 12 counts of serious child sexual abuse, four counts of child sexual abuse and one count of possession of child pornography. The victims are six boys who were between seven and 13 years old at the time of the crime. “The contact with the boys is said to have always come about in connection with their professional activity as a photographer,” says Jan Orth, spokesman for the district court.
the time reports that Lippoth denied the allegations last summer; At that time, the investigation was not over. When asked by SZ, the photographer’s lawyers now leave open whether he wants to continue to deny the allegations. In a statement, the defense speaks of “highly unfair and suggestive investigations”: “The procedures of the criminal police reveal a lot about deep-seated prejudices and an unbelievably blind zeal for the hunt. Constructs of decades-old events are used by dismissed employees, allegedly committed media representatives and women disappointed in their affection fueled.” One is “optimistic that in an objective main hearing the court can be brought closer to the true facts”. What those are remains open.
“Porsche, monster studio, business guy”
A stylist, who does not wish to be named, occasionally worked with Achim Lippoth, but never experienced anything that irritated her, “otherwise I would have said something”. She always experienced the productions with him as “very professional”. As she recalls, Lippoth is a man with a big ego – “Porsche, monster studio, business guy” – but who was well recognized in the industry for his imagery. “He was the avant-garde”, has written for international magazines like the Vogue Bambini photographed.
Children are not easy to photograph – in order to get good pictures, says another stylist, who used to work on other photographers’ fashion productions, you need a particularly pleasant, almost family atmosphere in the studio, which is why the child models are usually well taken care of : games, bubbles, sweets, lots of attention. And yet the stylist, herself the mother of a child, was very irritated by some of the recordings at the time, as she says: she saw children having to change their clothes in the presence of adults and then standing half-naked in front of strangers. As a mother in the US called out to her daughter: “Make love to the camera!” Because that’s what often happens: parents who don’t protect, but support a system in which children are seen primarily as a beautiful motif. These parents tend not to say anything when a photographer wants to have one of their young models on their laps for a remarkably long time – or just like Lippoth does time-according to a report, takes you on a jaunt by car or even invites you to stay the night. In part, they say nothing because their children give them a standard of living that they would not otherwise have.