Berlin It was a complete success for the “Para” investigative commission: the North Rhine-Westphalian investigators unearthed an illegal hawala banking system. Assets amounting to 22 million euros were secured. In the meantime, the Düsseldorf Regional Court has sentenced the men who smuggled funds into Turkey bypassing the legal financial system.
“We succeed in uncovering structures and networks and drying up sources of financing for crime,” said NRW Minister of Justice Peter Biesenbach (CDU) the Handelsblatt. “Crime must not be worthwhile.” The principle of “Follow the money” was moved further into the center and expanded with “Take the money”. There is a positive trend in asset recovery from crime.
Whether fraud, violations of the Narcotics Act, theft, money laundering or stolen goods – in the fight against crime it is playing an increasingly important role to steal the assets stolen from the criminals. This has become even more possible thanks to the reform of the criminal asset recovery.
Since the new regulation, which came into force in mid-2017, it has been easier for law enforcement officers to temporarily secure the loot. For example, they can access cash, jewelry, bank balances or real estate belonging to criminals, even if legal proceedings against the perpetrators cannot be carried out due to obstacles to persecution, for example.
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Most recently, the Federal Constitutional Court even ruled that asset recovery is permitted even if the offense was statute-barred before the reform. This is “exceptionally permissible due to overriding interests of the common good and compatible with the Basic Law”.
Rhineland-Palatinate: Asset absorption increased by more than 80 percent
All federal states are making use of these new opportunities, as current figures show. The State Criminal Police Office (LKA) Rhineland-Palatinate announced that in a five-year comparison – i.e. since 2016 and thus before the reform – the number of proceedings involving asset recovery had risen by more than 80 percent. Bavaria’s Justice Minister Georg Eisenreich (CSU) also sees that the legal adjustments are having an effect: “We start where the perpetrators are particularly hurt: with the booty.”
Hamburg’s Justice Senator Anna Gallina (Greens) affirmed that criminals would be hit at their “most sensitive point” with asset skimming. “We have therefore also specifically intensified the search for illegally obtained assets at the public prosecutor’s office,” Gallina told the Handelsblatt. “We take the dirty money away from illegal activities.”
Although the State Criminal Police Office keep statistics on temporarily secured assets and the number of cases, some of the data are classified as “classified information”. Upon request, the following picture emerges for 2020: Hesse skimmed around 77 million euros, Bavaria just under 56, North Rhine-Westphalia a good 54, Saxony just under 43 and Baden-Württemberg 25 million euros. The Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) announced that a total of around 529 million euros had been secured by various authorities across the country last year.
Most countries have now set up central offices for asset recovery. The individual procedures can be lengthy. In 2018, Berlin secured 77 properties with a total value of 9.3 million euros in the fight against “clan crime”. And according to the State Criminal Police Office, this case of organized crime is still being processed.
Baden-Württemberg’s Justice Minister Marion Gentges (CDU) says: “If you consistently use the possibilities of asset recovery, that means a considerable effort for the law enforcement authorities.” However, doing this is worthwhile – in the sense of consistent criminal prosecution, but also because it makes it Substantial amounts illegally received from criminal offenses could flow back to the state.
Baden-Württemberg: More than 30 new jobs for the fight against white-collar crime
The country is therefore focusing on the fight against white-collar crime, with more than 30 new jobs for courts and public prosecutors in this area. Hesse recently recorded a hefty plus for the state treasury from criminal offenses. Here, 100 million euros flowed into the budget. The increase comes from cryptocurrencies that have been confiscated in a darknet process and now used by a private bank for the country.
But politicians emphasize that there is more to it than that: “If the assets gained from criminal offenses are withdrawn quickly and comprehensively, the judiciary makes a major contribution to prevention,” Hesse’s Justice Minister Eva Kühne-Hörmann (CDU) told Handelsblatt. “Then the perpetrators’ funds for new acts are withdrawn and the incentive to commit new acts disappears.”
Fraud, burglary, theft – in Lower Saxony, according to the State Criminal Police Office, assets of almost 48 million euros were secured from all perpetrators caught last year. 24.6 million euros alone came from the attachment of assets on accounts, property seizures amounted to 8.2 million euros, the security of cash amounted to 7.3 million euros, vehicles – including SUVs – could be secured with a value of 5.3 million euros . And the seizure of movable objects such as watches and jewelry finally took place in the amount of 2.5 million euros.
This year, for example, the Lower Saxony investigators tracked down a professional cannabis plantation in a 2500 square meter former tennis hall. The discovered marijuana plants would have had a sales value of around four million euros. The investigators secured a quarter of a million euros directly when they were deployed. Hanover Zoo is now using the confiscated heat lamps.
“It is becoming increasingly clear that the reform of asset recovery has taken effect,” reports Christian Zahel, chief criminal director in Lower Saxony. “The number of proceedings and the secured assets have increased noticeably.” That is not only good for the state treasury. “Victims of crime are also happy when they get back even part of the booty.”
According to the investigators’ experience, Corona has changed the offenses somewhat. Crimes committed by traveling perpetrators, such as break-ins and ATM blow-ups, had declined after the border closings in the first lockdown.
For this purpose, the law enforcement authorities had to move out increasingly because of corona emergency aid fraud in the course of the pandemic. In Baden-Württemberg, for example, subsidy fraud rose to 333 cases in 2020 compared to 21 cases in the previous year. Advertisements related to the Corona emergency aid were the reason.
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