Sympatex criminal trial: Otto mail order family still in the spotlight

Stif­tung War­entest provides a good and in­form­at­ive re­port on the start of the Sym­pa­tex crim­inal trial. You can read the de­tails here: https://​www​.test​.de/​M​i​t​t​e​l​s​t​a​n​d​s​a​n​l​e​i​h​e​n​-​E​r​s​t​e​r​-​S​t​r​a​f​p​r​o​z​e​s​s​-​i​m​-​F​a​l​l​-​S​y​m​p​a​t​e​x​-​l​a​e​u​f​t​-​6​2​2​8​3​1​6​-0/ The de­fend­ants had sought an agree­ment with the pub­lic prosecutor’s of­fice, a so-​called ‘deal’. Their aim was to se­cure prison sen­tences of less than four years. How­ever, this ‘deal’ has failed for the time be­ing be­cause the court wants to con­duct fur­ther in­vest­ig­a­tions into the amount of dam­age. For now, the hear­ing of evid­ence will continue.

The fo­cus re­mains on the Otto fam­ily of en­tre­pren­eurs from Ham­burg. Not only is one of the de­fend­ants in the Sym­pa­tex crim­inal pro­ceed­ings, Munich-​based man­age­ment con­sult­ant Dr Stephan Goetz, re­lated by mar­riage to the Otto fam­ily: his wife In­gvild Goetz, née Otto, is the older sis­ter of Hamburg-​based com­pany pat­ri­arch Mi­chael Otto. In ad­di­tion, sev­eral mem­bers of the Otto fam­ily were per­son­ally in­volved in fin­an­cing the bond cut. This con­cerns In­gvild Goetz her­self, her daugh­ter Sarah Pis­ani and of­fi­cials of Cura KG, the Otto family’s Hamburg-​based fam­ily of­fice. Al­though these mem­bers of the Otto fam­ily are not sit­ting in the dock, civil claims for dam­ages by the ag­grieved bond­hold­ers are still be­ing con­sidered and can still be en­forced today. The SdK rightly points this out: https://​www​.bondguide​.de/​t​o​p​n​e​w​s​/​s​d​k​-​w​i​t​t​e​r​t​-​s​c​h​a​d​e​n​s​e​r​s​a​t​z​a​n​s​p​r​u​e​c​h​e​-​f​u​e​r​-​e​h​e​m​a​l​i​g​e​-​i​n​h​a​b​e​r​-​d​e​r​-​s​y​m​p​a​t​e​x​-​a​n​l​e​i​he/