In the dispute over the verbatim reproduction from his confiscated diaries, the Hamburg banker Christian Olearius failed before the Federal Constitutional Court. As the court in Karlsruhe announced, a constitutional complaint from the former head of the Hamburg Warburg Bank, which was involved in the “Cum-Ex” scandal, was not accepted for decision.
The Federal Court of Justice (BGH) had already decided last year that Southgerman newspaper was allowed to quote from Olearius’ diaries. The banker then appealed to the highest German court against the dismissal of his injunction.
The diaries were confiscated in March 2018 during a search of Olearius’ private rooms. Through the recordings, meetings between the then mayor of Hamburg and today’s Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) with the banker in 2016 and 2017 became known. The Southgerman newspaper published a report with quotes from the diaries on their website in September 2020. Olearius saw his personal rights violated and sued the SZ.
Almost a year ago, the BGH decided that the direct quotations were permitted. The verbatim reproduction enabled a complete and undistorted picture in the reporting on a topic for which there was an overwhelming public interest in information. According to the Federal Constitutional Court, Olearius was unable to adequately demonstrate a violation of his personal rights in his constitutional complaint.