Opportunity makes thieves – presumably also an industrial clerk from Munich, who is said to have relieved the real estate company for which he worked as a freelancer of 240,000 euros. A lay judge at the Munich district court has now sentenced the man to two years and four months in prison for embezzlement. However, the judgment (Az. 824 Ls 252 Js 151990/20) is not yet final. Because both the accused and the public prosecutor’s office have appealed against the decision before the Munich I Regional Court.
In the criminal proceedings before the district court, the 60-year-old defendant asserted to the end that he had taken the money with the consent of the real estate company. As early as 2017, he was promised a monthly old-age pension of 5,000 euros as a “thank you” for his “years of service in the administration”. But nothing came of it. Instead, the real estate company promised him that he would be given a 90 square meter apartment instead of the stately monthly pension. However, this promise was later called into question. For this reason, according to the defendant, he demanded collateral from the company. In April 2020, he was “requested” by the real estate company during a conversation via Skype to take an amount of 240,000 euros from a safe as “security”.
The employee should previously withdraw a quarter of a million and deposit it in the safe
Four weeks before this ominous request, the defendant had deposited the amount himself in the safe on the company’s instructions. In March 2020, a person in charge of the real estate company had authorized the industrial clerk from the USA by telephone to withdraw 250,000 euros from the business account and deposit it in the company vault. The industrial clerk should then change the combination. Sometime between the end of March and the beginning of April, however, the accused is said to have taken the entire amount up to 10,000 euros.
There is no written agreement for the mysterious deal, according to which the industrial clerk was supposedly allowed to take 240,000 euros out of the safe as “security”. The amount was not acknowledged by the 60-year-old either. After taking the money, the industrial clerk moved to another federal state. A search was carried out at his new address. There, the police investigators discovered a large part of the money in a freezer – hidden under coffee powder.
A representative of the real estate company explained in court that the amount of more than 250,000 euros was actually intended to pay bills and salaries because the banks were partially closed due to the corona pandemic. The accused had “definitely not received any promises or gifts” from the company.
The presiding judge of the jury did not believe the industrial clerk. His admission was “not credible and should only be seen as a protective claim”. It is incomprehensible that the company, after it had moved away from its alleged promise of a monthly pension payment of 5,000 euros, but then suddenly allowed him to take 240,000 euros from the company safe.
In favor of the industrial clerk, the court assumed that it was an act of opportunity and that the accused was “possibly frustrated” because he thought he was entitled to more money. At the expense of the 60-year-old, the jury judged a previous conviction for tax evasion from 2014.