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Uli Hoeneß
Photo: Frank Hoermann / Sven Simon / IMAGO
Uli Hoeneß is to testify in the summer fairy tale trial before the Frankfurt am Main regional court.
Judge Eva-Marie Distler said at the start of the second day of the trial that the honorary president of record champions Bayern Munich had been invited as a witness on April 15th.
The reason for this are statements made by Hoeneß from 2020 and 2021. At that time, the now 72-year-old indicated in a TV interview and in the podcast “11 Leben” that he knew why there were the dubious millions in payments surrounding the 2006 World Cup in Germany.
The statements of the three accused former top officials of the German Football Association (DFB) were expected on Thursday.
The former presidents Theo Zwanziger and Wolfgang Niersbach as well as the long-standing general secretary Horst R. Schmidt are charged with "evading or aiding in the evasion of corporation tax, solidarity surcharge, trade tax and sales tax for the year 2006 in the amount of over 13.7 million euros in favor of the DFB." burden placed.
Niersbach, Zwanziger and Schmidt reject the allegations.
The investigation into the opaque money flows surrounding the 2006 World Cup has been dragging on for several years.
At the end of the first day of the trial, Niersbach and Schmidt's lawyers requested that the proceedings be discontinued.
If this happens, the public prosecutor's office will probably want to take further legal action.
The public prosecutor's office had previously shown itself open to an out-of-court settlement.
Distler stated that she was “not opposed to a premature end to the process,” but that the “right time” for it had not yet come.
Therefore, 24 days of negotiations are scheduled until October 28th.
jan/sid