court process
RBB crisis: ex-director takes action against dismissal
Verena Formen-Mohr, former head of the directorship department at the crisis-hit Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg (RBB), is sitting next to her lawyer Detlef Grimm in the labor court. photo
© Anna Ringle/dpa
Verena Formen-Mohr was dismissed without notice – for example because she had billed private trips as business trips. That never happened, says Formen-Mohr and defends himself.
The former head of the directorship department at the crisis-ridden Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg (RBB) is defending herself in court against her extraordinary dismissal. Verena Formen-Mohr read out a lengthy statement today at the hearing in the Berlin Labor Court.
“As the implementer of decisions and resolutions – I checked that thoroughly afterwards – I can’t blame myself to this day,” she said. Arbitrarily, as is now being assumed, she never initiated or commissioned a single contract. She implemented the resolutions and decisions of the director and the management, to which she herself was not a member.
The court withdrew at noon. It remains unclear whether a decision will be made in the proceedings today.
connection with broadcasting crisis
The legal dispute is about the extraordinary termination of the ex-head of the artistic directorship in the context of the crisis of the public ARD broadcaster RBB. In the summer of 2022, allegations of waste and nepotism were made against the director Patricia Schlesinger, who was later dismissed without notice, and the head of the board of directors, Wolf-Dieter Wolf.
Both rejected allegations. The old management is no longer in office. The public prosecutor’s office is investigating against Schlesinger and Wolf as well as part of the management at the time.
Formen-Mohr, who has been working for public broadcasters for more than 25 years and most recently headed the main directorate department for a few years, was initially released after the broadcaster crisis and later dismissed without notice.
The specific allegations
During the hearing, it became clear that the ARD broadcaster accuses her, for example, of having billed business trips to Israel and Paris. The broadcaster believes that these were of a private nature. It is also about the accusation of signing off an invoice for consultants, although there was no contract. And for the now buried million-euro construction project Digitales Medienhaus, Formen-Mohr is said to have not mentioned the actual amount of the expected costs in a draft resolution for the supervisory board.
Plaintiff Formen-Mohr and her lawyer firmly rejected the allegations during the hearing. She also said she felt that reasons were simply sought and constructed to get rid of her.