The public prosecutor’s office in Osnabrück stopped investigating a suspect shortly before the 2021 federal elections after searches in the Federal Ministry of Finance. This is an employee of the “Financial Intelligence Unit” (FIU), which reports to the Ministry of Finance, as the public prosecutor announced on Wednesday.
The FIU is a special unit of customs against money laundering. According to the information, the investigations were discontinued due to a lack of sufficient suspicion and due to the complex and unclear legal situation. The employee was suspected of attempting to thwart criminal prosecution. He is said to have played a key role in developing the so-called “risk-based approach” in the fight against money laundering. According to the public prosecutor’s office, this still stipulates that not every incoming suspected money laundering report is comprehensively analyzed. According to the public prosecutor’s office, this is not compatible with the Money Laundering Act.
However, a legal opinion commissioned by the Federal Ministry of Finance contradicts this point of view. In 2021, 17 days before the general election, the Osnabrück public prosecutor’s office had the Federal Ministry of Finance, led by today’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD), and the Federal Ministry of Justice, also led by the SPD, searched for investigations against the FIU. Several politicians accused the then CDU-led Lower Saxony Ministry of Justice of abuse of power for election campaign purposes. The searches were subsequently classified as unlawful by the Osnabrück Regional Court.