Research on ex “Bild” boss: New allegations against Reichelt

“Spiegel” has published parts of the research on ex “Bild” boss Reichelt, which the Ippen Verlag had withheld. The main focus is on how Reichelt treats women under him. Springer board member Döpfner is also coming under increasing criticism.

The revelations about the former “Bild” editor-in-chief did not come from Germany, but from the USA: On Sunday evening, the “New York Times” published an article about corporate culture at Axel Springer in general and “Bild” in particular. The article included new details on how Reichelt allegedly treated young women he had affairs with at work.

Reichelt was released from his duties yesterday. Before the decision of the Axel Springer board of directors was announced, however, it was also made public that the investigative team of the German Ippen group, which includes “Frankfurter Rundschau”, “Münchner Merkur” and “Buzzfeed Germany”, about the alleged Reichelt’s abuse of power wanted to report – but the publisher Dirk Ippen had stopped reporting shortly before it was published.

Approaching women “often following the same pattern”

Now “Spiegel” has published parts of the previously held back research by the Ippen investigative team on the alleged abuse of power in the Axel Springer media company. The focus of the article is on how the long-time “Bild” editor-in-chief Reichelt dealt with women who report to him.

In the research published by “Spiegel” it is said that Reichelt approached young women in his editorial team “often following the same pattern”. He praised them for their work, entrusted them with responsible tasks or placed them in positions for which they were not suitable. However, this advantage was often associated with a sexual relationship with women.

According to the research, one of the women suffered so much from the pressure of a position assigned to her and the comments in the college that she only got the job because of her relationship with the boss that she went into psychiatric treatment. She met Reichelt several times in hotels. She didn’t want to upset him and felt dependent on him for work.

Apparently little interest in education

According to “Spiegel” there are doubts as to whether Springer-Verlag was interested in a serious explanation of Reichelt’s behavior in the spring. Reichelt was released at his own request and the company initiated a compliance investigation. Such a procedure is intended, among other things, to check compliance with internal company guidelines. But at the end of March, Reichelt returned to his workplace. The reason given was that the board of the media group did not see it as justified to dismiss Reichelt from his post, despite identified errors in office and personnel management.

After Reichelt’s return, Springer CEO Mathias Döpfner turned to the workforce in a video conference, as “Medieninsider” had first reported. In it he said that he found private relationships in a hierarchical relationship “not exemplary, not acceptable”, but that Reichelt’s work was successful, and that his journalistic work was “right and extremely important for this country”.

Döpfner: Courageous against the “new GDR authoritarian state”

In this context, the “Spiegel” quotes a message from Döpfner to the writer Benjamin von Stuckrad-Barre. On the day of the news, Reichelt wrote a comment in which he described the corona measures as evidence of an arbitrary state. Döpfner then wrote that Reichelt was “really the last and only journalist in Germany who still bravely revolted against the new GDR governmental state”. Most of the other journalists have become propaganda assistants. Stuckrad-Barre is said to have ended the friendship with Döpfner because of the handling of the Reichelt case.

Another explosive aspect of the news is that Döpfner is chairman of the Federal Association of Digital Publishers and Newspaper Publishers. The media journalist Stefan Niggemeier wrote on Twitter that it was “a shame that someone like Döpfner is your top representative”.

The editor-in-chief of the DWDL media magazine, Thomas Lückerath, wrote in a comment that the case raised the question of why Döpfner was so rarely criticized in Germany “despite repeated insane statements”.