The Frankfurt Regional Court has admitted the charges brought by the Frankfurt Public Prosecutor's Office against Frankfurt's Lord Mayor Peter Feldmann (SPD) and opened the main proceedings.
The court confirmed this when asked by the FAZ.
It is therefore clear that Feldmann will have to answer in court for the allegation of accepting an advantage.
If a court allows an indictment, it means that the judges, after preliminary evaluation of the evidence, have come to the conclusion that a conviction is more likely than an acquittal.
Nevertheless, the presumption of innocence applies.
In the main proceedings, the criminal division can form its own opinion and come to a different conclusion.
There is no date for the main hearing yet.
Anna Sophia Lang
Editor in the Rhein-Main-Zeitung.
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In the indictment, the public prosecutor's office accuses Feldmann of having used his position to get his partner at the time and later wife a position as manager of a German-Turkish day-care center run by the AWO, for which she was paid above the tariff and given a company car.
The agreements were concluded “in the presence and under the influence” of Feldmann.
The employment relationship was concluded "due to his official position as mayor".
Feldmann was aware that there was no "objective reason" for salary and company car.
The commitment for this position was given in the spring of 2014 "by a person responsible at the time for the district association of the AWO Frankfurt".
This means Hannelore Richter, wife of Jürgen Richter: She was managing director of the Wiesbaden AWO district association and special representative for Frankfurt, her husband managed the business of the Frankfurt district association and was deputy chairman of the Wiesbaden district association.
Both are being investigated in connection with the operation of refugee accommodation for the city of Frankfurt on suspicion of infidelity and fraud.
Another allegation is that the AWO "supported Feldmann by raising donations" in the election campaign for the mayoral office in 2018.
"In return, the accused is said to have tacitly agreed with the AWO manager at the time that he would benevolently take into account the interests of the AWO Frankfurt in his future office." According to information from the FAZ, the AWO is said to have contacted and addressed a large number of people in a targeted manner donate them to Feldmann.
In return, the mayor is said to have supported the organization in his office as mayor.
Since the indictment was filed, Feldmann's lawyer had never doubted that there would be a trial.
The specialist in civil service law justified this by saying that this was a circumstantial process, which is why he assumed that the criminal division would form its own picture in the main proceedings.
In this respect, the decision of the district court is not a surprise.
Feldmann himself has always called the prosecutor's allegations "unfounded and excessive".
Last week, when he appeared in front of the cameras after his own party had called for his resignation, he reiterated: "I'm not corrupt."
Feldmann said he would prove his innocence in court.
In fact, in a criminal trial it is not the accused who has to prove his innocence, but the public prosecutor's office who has to prove his guilt.
Feldmann was recently criticized not only because of the indictment, but also because of his appearance at the reception of the European Cup winners from Eintracht Frankfurt in the Römer.
On the way to the Kaisersaal, he took the trophy out of the hands of coach Oliver Glasner and captain Sebastian Rode and ran away with it.
Eintracht later declared him an undesirable person in the stadium.
Previously, a video from the plane full of Eintracht fans on the way to the final in Seville had become known, in which Feldmann held the on-board microphone in his hand and said that the flight attendants had "hormonally knocked him out".
This statement earned him the accusation of sexism.
Taken together, all this led to the fact that last week the SPD also called on him to resign immediately.
Previously, the party had only asked for his resignation if the indictment was admitted.
Feldmann does not want to comply with this, however.
He merely announced that he wanted to suspend his membership in the SPD, which he had already announced weeks ago in the event that the indictment was admitted.
Apart from that, he had decided "until the end of the summer break almost completely without representative appointments in the Paulskirche and Kaisersaal." Otherwise he would "exercise restraint and stop the city's media work on my appointments."
In his party and its coalition partners of the Greens, FDP and Volt, he did not meet with approval.
On Friday, the alliance announced that it wanted to initiate a voting procedure.
The CDU had been trying to do this for a long time, but had no chance of success because they did not have the votes of the coalition.
At least half of the city councilors must submit a vote to be voted out, after which two-thirds must pass a resolution.
Because the mayor is elected directly by the people, the citizens also have to vote him out: This requires a majority of the votes, which accounts for at least 30 percent of those entitled to vote.
In 2018, when Feldmann was re-elected, just 30.2 percent of those eligible to vote had cast their votes.