In the Wirecard trial in Munich, the key witness and former Wirecard manager Oliver Bellenhaus revealed that business contracts and documents had been forged. “Of course we thought of all of that,” he said in court.
In the Munich Wirecard trial, the key witness for the public prosecutor’s office comprehensively confirmed the central allegation of the prosecution: The alleged billions in sales of the Dax group, which collapsed in 2020, with “third-party partners” in the Middle East and Asia were therefore fictitious. Former Wirecard manager Oliver Bellenhaus described in detail the falsification of business contracts and sales on Wednesday. “Of course we came up with that,” said Bellenhaus on the sixth day of the trial about the billion-euro bookings on trust accounts in Southeast Asia.
When the court asked explicitly whether the third-party business existed, Bellenhaus said: “I answer very clearly: no.” The payment service provider had filed for bankruptcy in the summer of 2020 because 1.9 billion euros allegedly booked in said trust accounts could not be found. The “third-party partners” were companies that allegedly processed credit card payments on behalf of Wirecard in countries where the Bavarian group itself did not have a corresponding license.
The only goal was to deceive the auditors. “The auditor needed something, and then the panic ensued,” said Bellenhaus. “It was a huge chaos, it was all chaos.” CEO Markus Braun never asked when he signed – fake – contracts.
According to the indictment, Braun, Bellenhaus and the former head of accounting have falsified Wirecard’s balance sheets since 2015 and damaged lending banks by 3.1 billion euros.
