The change of “Germany’s most powerful public prosecutor” Anne Brorhilker is a coup for the anti-finance lobby Finanzwende. In her new job, the lawyer will soon find herself at odds with some of her previous colleagues.
It was an application that no one in the citizens’ movement for financial transition had expected. Last spring, the anti-financial lobby organization advertised a leadership position in the area of financial crime. The advertisement had already been on the website for a while when a prominent applicant came forward out of the blue: Anne Brorhilker, senior public prosecutor and cum-ex hunter from Cologne, also known to many as “Germany’s most powerful public prosecutor”.
When he found out about Brorhilker’s interest, he “almost fell off his chair,” says Gerhard Schick, founder and board member of Finanzwende. Confidential discussions were held and the supervisory board was called in, and it has now been clear since Monday: the investigator has asked to be released from public service and will start as another managing director at Finanzwende. Starting time: depending on when your previous employer, the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, will terminate the civil service relationship.
The move of one of the most prominent prosecutors, whose name has been closely linked to the investigation of the republic’s biggest tax scandal for years, directly to the head of an NGO is a spectacular step. It certainly happens that investigators in large economic cases are withdrawn over time or change positions within the judicial system. This was recently the case in the Wirecard scandal, where the Munich chief investigator for years left the investigative authority during the first trial, which was still ongoing, and is now responsible for asset recovery at the Attorney General’s Office.
But the fact that a senior public prosecutor, after eleven years of investigative work in a case like Cum Ex, which involves the largest tax robbery in German history and political complications up to the current Federal Chancellor, doesn’t just ask for a transfer, but immediately leaves the civil service it probably hasn’t existed before.
Reductions in salary
Brorhilker’s move commanded him “the utmost respect,” says Finanzwende founder Schick when he reported on the coup and the plans with his future colleague the day after the completely surprising personnel change. He didn’t “calculate down to the last cent” how much money Brorhilker would be giving up through her move. But it is clear that the previous senior public prosecutor is accepting a “financial cut” – for example because her departure from public service also has consequences for her pension provision. He thinks it’s good that Brorhilker “isn’t going to Deloitte and turning their knowledge into money,” says Schick – but in the future will fight with Finanzwende to improve the inadequate structures in the fight against financial crime in Germany and to push back the influence of the financial lobby, especially on the justice system.
Brorhilker himself does not speak on this day. As long as she is still in government service, she will not make any further press appointments, it is said. But the 50-year-old cum-ex hunter had already touched on the motives behind her decision to quit as a prosecutor in a remarkable interview with WDR on Monday. In it she also made allegations against politics.
She is “a prosecutor with heart and soul,” but “not at all satisfied with the way financial crime is prosecuted in Germany,” says Brorhilker. The justice system here is often too weak and the accused can often “simply buy their way out” of the proceedings with the help of the best lawyers. But such deals are unfair and could lead to people “losing trust in the rule of law.” Brorhilker also shares the sense of justice that some citizens feel when it comes to tax crime: “You hang the little ones, you let the big ones go.” A remarkable statement for a senior public prosecutor.
Even in the Cum Ex case, as she makes clear in the WDR interview, Brorhilker misses the support from politics. She has noticed how “difficult it is to get support for the Cum-Ex investigation,” she says – although it is clear to everyone that the issue is very important given the billions in damage.
Brorhilker had a power struggle with the Minister
She cites the fragmentation of responsibilities in the judiciary due to federalism as one reason for this – probably an indication that colleagues in the judicial authorities of other countries tried to slow down the investigations of her Cologne team rather than support them. For example, the one in Hamburg, where the private bank Warburg was deeply involved in the illegal cum-ex deals, but could rely on the goodwill of the Senate under the then mayor Olaf Scholz.
Brorhilker recently also had to discover the consequences of the fact that public prosecutors in Germany are subordinate to politics at home in North Rhine-Westphalia. In September 2023, State Justice Minister Benjamin Limbach (Greens) made headlines with a planned intervention at the Cologne public prosecutor’s office. Chief investigator Brorhilker was supposed to be assigned a colleague to her side – supposedly to speed up the investigation against the around 1,800 accused nationwide. But Limbach’s plans were interpreted by many as the disempowerment of the cum-ex hunter and political sabotage of her investigations – including by Brorhilker himself.
The public prosecutor today makes no secret of the fact that Limbach’s advance surprised her at the time – and that she by no means saw it as the exoneration that the minister wanted to sell it as. Limbach dropped his plans after sharp public criticism. Nevertheless, the showdown with her top employer may have strengthened Brorhilker’s intentions to change. The investigator had already been whistled back by superiors in 2020 when she was planning a raid in Hamburg in the particularly politically explosive Warburg Bank case.
What makes Brorhilker’s resignation so remarkable is that she is apparently convinced that she can now do more to combat financial crime at the head of an NGO than in her role as an investigator. Finanzwende founder Schick, as a former financial politician for the Greens in the Bundestag, himself a changer of sides, can understand this. The “effect” of the personnel will be seen soon, he announced on Tuesday – even if Brorhilkers will continue to be bound by the confidentiality obligations from her job as an investigator in her new role.
Cum-Ex “weak points” Hamburg and Stuttgart
Schick makes it clear that the organization in the Cum Ex complex also wants to increase the pressure on law enforcement authorities, which have so far been “weak points” – unlike the Cologne ones, which are well positioned even without Brorhilker. Specifically, Schick first names the Hamburg public prosecutor’s office, which has so far been a “total failure” in pursuing the cum-ex deals – even though several Hamburg banks are involved in the scandal, including Warburg and the former Landesbank HSH.
The question is whether the authority in the Hanseatic city is incompetent, corrupt or lazy, says Schick – or whether there may have been political instructions to hold back because there are connections in this complex to ex-mayor Scholz and his successor Peter Tschentscher (both SPD). According to Schick, the same applies to the public prosecutor’s office in Stuttgart, which has been investigating the Landesbank LBBW case for many years without any tangible results. The Hamburg Justice Senator from the Greens and the Baden-Württemberg CDU Justice Minister have a duty here: “Whether financial crime is properly combated is a question of political will.”
Schick’s future financial transition colleague Brorhilker sounded similar in her first statements. It could be that Germany’s most powerful off-duty public prosecutor will soon not only step on the toes of her previous colleagues in public if they, in her view, treat financial criminals too considerately – but also take on the thwarters in politics.
Source: Stern
