Bayernlb sues ecclestone for 400 million dollars
This was confirmed by a spokesman in response to a dpa inquiry. With this, the bavarian state bank makes serious with its announcement of wanting to collect money from ecclestone. In addition to the damages trial, the head of the racing series is also facing criminal proceedings on suspicion of bribery.
The landesbank used to be a major shareholder in formula 1 and believes it sold its shares too cheaply to investor CVC in 2006 because of an agreement between ecclestone and its board member at the time, gerhard gribkowsky. Ecclestone’s lawyer could not be reached for comment on wednesday.
In june 2012, gribkowsky was sentenced to eight and a half years’ imprisonment by the munich regional court on charges including corruption. The manager had admitted to having given ecclestone a commission of 66 million dollars when he sold the bayernlb shares in formula 1, 44 million dollars of which secretly flowed back to him.
The commission is part of the sum that bayernlb is demanding from ecclestone. In total, the bank is demanding more than 400 million dollars from the 83-year-old formula 1 boss. In order to substantiate its accusations, the bank has requested access to the documents of the public prosecutor’s office. But this is currently still warping.
The munich public prosecutor had charged ecclestone in the summer with bribery and aiding and abetting embezzlement. The regional court will decide next year whether to allow the prosecution to proceed. Ecclestone had always denied the accusations and presented the payment of millions to gribkowsky as a kind of hush money so that he would not denounce him to the british tax authorities.
If there is a trial against ecclestone, it will take place in munich. As the defendant, he had to appear in person in court. Ecclestone was already in court as a witness in the trial against gribkowsky a good two years ago, but was allowed to take off again afterwards.
