Bernd Wiegand

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Bernd Wiegand (2013)

Bernd Wiegand (born February 23, 1957 in Braunschweig ) is a German local politician ( non-party , formerly SPD ). He has been Lord Mayor of the city of Halle (Saale) since December 1, 2012 . The city council suspended Wiegand from his official business on April 7, 2021.

curriculum vitae

Bernd Wiegand graduated from the Lessinggymnasium Braunschweig in 1976 . He completed his studies at the Braunschweig / Wolfenbüttel University of Applied Sciences in 1982 as a graduate in administration. Until 1990 he worked as deputy head of department in the Wolfenbüttel district , then in Lower Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt as a university teacher. In 2001 he received his doctorate in law from the Martin Luther University in Halle-Wittenberg . From 2008 he was the councilor for safety, health and sport in the city of Halle (Saale) . In 2009 he became a member of the SPD. In March 2011 Wiegand resigned from the SPD, but remained an alderman until 2012. When he was elected Lord Mayor of the City of Halle (Saale) on July 1, 2012, he received 19.88% of the votes in the first ballot. In the runoff election on July 15, 2012, he prevailed with 52.92% of the votes against Bernhard Bönisch ( CDU ), who received 47.08% of the votes. In the next election for Mayor of Halle on October 13, 2019, Bernd Wiegand received 44.34% of the votes in the first ballot. In the runoff election on October 27, 2019, he prevailed with 61.42% of the vote against Hendrik Lange (Die Linke), who received 38.58% of the vote.

Legal disputes

Allegation of bullying

In January 2014, the Magdeburg Administrative Court assessed Wiegand's behavior towards one of its employees during his work as an alderman as bullying . His attempt to reverse a disciplinary order issued against him and the associated pay cut of 20% failed .

Accusation of infidelity

In February 2014, the Halle public prosecutor brought charges against Bernd Wiegand on suspicion of breach of trust in three cases. Bernd Wiegand is accused of having classified his three closest employees in the city administration in too high a level of experience after taking office as Lord Mayor, which is why they are said to have been paid an excessive salary. The city of Halle (Saale) is said to have suffered damage of around 300,000 euros over a period of seven years. The Halle Regional Court admitted the indictment to the main hearing in April 2014 . At the same time, the state administrative office of Saxony-Anhalt, as the municipal supervisory authority, requested the city council of the city of Halle (Saale) to initiate disciplinary proceedings against Bernd Wiegand on account of the allegation of infidelity , which, however, will remain pending the conclusion of the criminal proceedings. The main hearing took place from July 3, 2014 to February 9, 2015. On February 9, 2015, Bernd Wiegand was acquitted of the allegation of infidelity by the Commercial Criminal Chamber of the Halle Regional Court. The presiding judge emphasized in the oral justification of the judgment that Wiegand had committed a breach of duty when recruiting, and that the grouping into the appropriate level of experience had been made “for reasons other than that according to the public service collective agreement”. In addition, he had "purposefully disregarded the usual recruitment practice in the city administration". Nevertheless, an error-free discretionary decision can be assumed. The 4th Criminal Senate of the BGH overturned the acquittal judgment on the appeal of the public prosecutor's office on May 24, 2016 (Az. 4 StR 440/15) and referred the matter back to a commercial criminal chamber of the Magdeburg Regional Court for renewed hearing and decision. As a justification, the BGH stated that the criminal chamber's interpretation of the prerequisites for the offense of the relevant collective bargaining provisions, taking into account the relevant labor court case law, already reveals sweeping legal errors. The assumption that the defendant therefore did not act contrary to his duty in the sense of breach of trust under Section 266 of the Criminal Code is not viable for this reason alone. The mayor's discretion is limited by the public service collective agreement, which does not provide for such a high classification of new employees. It is also not the case that the positions would otherwise have remained vacant - the three of them hadn't asked that much money on their own. When assessing previous professional experience, the district court relied too much on Wiegand's presentation. The new main hearing before the Magdeburg Regional Court began on May 4, 2017. Wiegand was acquitted again on October 6, 2017. The judges found that Wiegand had neither breached his duties nor exceeded the margin of appreciation that he was entitled to as Lord Mayor when hiring new employees. The judgment has been final since January 2018. The public prosecutor had previously withdrawn the initial appeal after examining the written grounds for the judgment.

Early corona vaccination

As it became known in February 2021, Wiegand was vaccinated against SARS-Cov-2 on January 17, 2021 - contrary to the current prioritization . He received a call from a vaccination team and was vaccinated in a hospital. Previously, he had made sure several times that no hospital employee was available for a spontaneous vaccination. He did not make the vaccination transparent because it was a private matter. According to media reports, ten city councilors were also vaccinated ahead of time. The mayor's entire office, including interns, had also been vaccinated. Vaccine was used, which would otherwise have become unusable at the end of the day and was assigned by a random generator. Wiegand denied the vaccination of his entire office: Only the members of the pandemic staff and 10 city councilors had been vaccinated. Nevertheless, the councilor for culture of the city of Halle is also vaccinated. This is not part of the pandemic staff.

State Minister of Health Petra Grimm-Benne criticized this as an abuse of the nationwide vaccination sequence. The FDP in Halle called on Wiegand to resign.

From February 16, 2021, Wiegand refused to answer journalists ' questions about the vaccination scandal during the daily press conference on the corona situation in the city . He justified this by wanting to first inform the city ​​council in detail. As of February 17, 2021, the daily press conferences were suspended without notice. The official reason given was that interest in the press conferences had rapidly declined (which, however, disproves the number of views of the videos). Wiegand appeared in the February 25 broadcast of Markus Lanz on.

Wiegand repeatedly got caught up in contradictions, so it turned out during the city council meeting on February 17, 2021 that he and 28 other people were not selected by a random generator , but by a six-eyes principle . This procedure contradicts an internal management note that has been published back to January 5th. A six-eyes principle and a random generator are prescribed there. Several city council factions therefore called for the initiation of a voting process against Wiegand.

A special session of the city council in camera was scheduled for March 15, 2021. Three motions from the CDU, SPD, FDP and Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen parliamentary groups should be dealt with. The content of these motions was the initiation of a voting procedure, the three-month leave of absence from Wiegand, the issuing of a ban on him and the enforcement of access to files. On March 14, the administrative court banned the special session. The reason was the failure to meet the notice period. On April 7, 2021, the city council held a special meeting and voted with a two-thirds majority in favor of the motion for Wiegand's suspension brought in by the Left, Greens, SPD and FDP.

Disciplinary Proceedings and Law Enforcement

On 19 February 2021 the led state administration of a disciplinary one against Wiegand. Three days later, the Halle public prosecutor's office searched Wiegand's offices, the municipal vaccination center and the health department . The mayor is accused of misappropriating embezzlement (Section 246, Paragraph 1, Paragraph 2 of the Criminal Code) of vaccination doses. On March 20, 2021 Wiegand published a legal opinion commissioned by the legal scientist Thomas Rönnau . It came to the conclusion that neither the developed procedure nor the vaccination of Wiegand fulfilled the criteria for the misappropriating embezzlement. On April 6, 2021, the Mitteldeutsche Zeitung reported on a previously unpublished interim report by the public prosecutor's office. Accordingly, at no time was there a risk of vaccine doses being discarded; Wiegand systematically disregarded the federal vaccination ordinance.

Relationship with the city council

Wiegand hands over the Halloren Cup of SV Halle , 2020 with diver Andreas Wels

Relations between Wiegand and the city council of Halle (Saale) had been very tense for a long time. At the instigation of the CDU, SPD and FDP, the council sought disciplinary proceedings against him since December 2015; this is about unauthorized decisions, personnel issues and dealing with employees.

Wiegand was also criticized for his premature corona vaccination; several city councilors had asked him to resign. In addition, some city councils launched a suspension procedure against Wiegand, which was successful on April 7, 2021. Furthermore, some city councilors are currently launching a voting procedure against Wiegand.

Fonts

  • Bernd Wiegand, Michael Grimberg: Is the unified community more economical than the administrative community or the collective community? Grimberg, Ostbevern 2007, ISBN 978-3-9810896-3-9 .
  • Bernd Wiegand (publisher / author) and Michael Grimberg: Municipality code of Saxony-Anhalt. Commentary, third edition, CH Beck, Munich 2003
  • Bernd Wiegand (publisher since 1994): Collection of regulations for the administration in Saxony-Anhalt - VSV, loose-leaf collection, Richard-Boorberg-Verlag, Munich / Stuttgart
  • Bernd Wiegand (publisher / author): "apf" magazine (training, examination, advanced training), part of Saxony-Anhalt. Since 2006 editor of the federal edition. Richard Boorberg Verlag, Munich / Stuttgart
  • Bernd Wiegand (publisher / author since 2006): Practice of local government, state edition of Saxony-Anhalt, comments and systematic presentations of all legal areas of local government. Municipal and school publishing house, Wiesbaden

Web links

Commons : Bernd Wiegand  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ CV on the official website
  2. ↑ Interview with Bernd Wiegand
  3. ↑ Final election result for the election of Lord Mayor on July 1, 2012 in the city of Halle (Saale) ( Memento from July 5, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) - On the website of the city of Halle
  4. ↑ Final election result for the runoff election for Mayor on July 15, 2012 in the city of Halle (Saale) ( Memento from July 17, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) - On the website of the city of Halle
  5. ↑ https://wahlresults.halle.de/bw2019stichkompakt.html
  6. ↑ http://www.lvz-online.de/nachrichten/mitteldeutschland/gericht-zaehlt-halles-obm-wegen-mobbing-an-staatsanwalt-verntung-wiegand/r-mitteldeutschland-a-222858.html
  7. ↑ Mitteldeutsche Zeitung of February 22, 2014, pages 1 and 9
  8. ↑ Mitteldeutsche Zeitung of April 10, 2014, pages 1 and 7
  9. ↑ Mitteldeutsche Zeitung of May 23, 2014, page 9
  10. ↑ Infidelity trial against Bernd Wiegand: Court acquits Hall's mayor: Halle / Saalekreis - Mitteldeutsche Zeitung. Retrieved February 9, 2015 .
  11. ↑ Mitteldeutsche Zeitung of February 10, 2015, pages 1 and 3
  12. ^ Infidelity trial against Halle's mayor: Bernd Wiegand has to go to court again. Retrieved May 24, 2016 .
  13. ↑ Press release of the BGH No. 090/2016 of May 24, 2016
  14. ↑ BGH overturns acquittal. Retrieved May 25, 2016 .
  15. ↑ Mitteldeutsche Zeitung of May 3, 2017, page 7
  16. ↑ Mitteldeutsche Zeitung from 7./8. October 2017, page 8
  17. ^ Second acquittal for Halles OB. Retrieved February 21, 2019 .
  18. ^ Acquittal for mayor Wiegand final. Retrieved February 21, 2019 .
  19. ↑ a b Hendrik Schmidt: Local politicians and police officers were preferred for corona vaccination. In: spiegel.de. February 6, 2021, accessed February 6, 2021 .
  20. ↑ Dirk Skrzypczak: "Up to interns" vaccination affair around Bernd Wiegand - entire OB office vaccinated? In: mz-web.de. February 6, 2021, accessed February 7, 2021 .
  21. ↑ Markus Lanz of February 25, 2021. Retrieved on February 26, 2021 .
  22. ↑ Jonas Nayda: According to the mayor and some city councilors: Have Halle's cultural officials also been vaccinated? February 12, 2021, accessed on February 26, 2021 (German).
  23. ↑ Jonas Nayda: Vaccination affair in Halle : Mayor Bernd Wiegand is now silent on the allegations. February 16, 2021, accessed on February 22, 2021 (German).
  24. ↑ Jonas Nayda: Vaccination affair in Halle : Mayor Wiegand is now dispensing with a daily video press conference. February 16, 2021, accessed on February 22, 2021 (German).
  25. ↑ Everything about markus lanz --quotemeter.de. Retrieved on February 26, 2021 (German).
  26. ↑ mdr.de: Lord Mayor of Halle: But no random generator for controversial vaccinations | MDR.DE. Retrieved February 22, 2021 .
  27. ↑ Daniel Schöppe: Administrative note "Handling residual vaccine doses of the SARS-CoV-2 vaccination". City of Halle, February 6, 2021, accessed on February 26, 2021 .
  28. ↑ mdr.de: Halle's city council chairwoman Katja Müller: Tackling measures against Wiegand together | MDR.DE. Retrieved February 22, 2021 .
  29. ↑ Forced leave of absence? OB accounting behind closed doors - does the vote on the proposal burst due to referral to the committees? - You are Halle. Retrieved March 3, 2021 .
  30. ↑ Halle administrative court stops city council meeting on Wiegand's suspension - you are Halle. Retrieved March 16, 2021 .
  31. ↑ New attempt for Wiegand's suspension on April 7th - this time public - You are Halle. Retrieved March 16, 2021 .
  32. ↑ Consequences of the vaccination affair How things continue after the suspension of Mayor Wiegand in Halle. In: mdr.de . April 8, 2021, accessed on April 8, 2021 : “In the partially closed special session, 34 city councilors voted to temporarily withdraw the mayor's office. 13 voted against, there was one abstention. The request for this was brought in by the Left, the Greens, the SPD and the FDP. "
  33. ↑ Disciplinary proceedings initiated against Wiegand and two district administrators. In: mdr.de. Retrieved February 22, 2021 .
  34. ↑ Halle public prosecutor's office searches the offices of the city of Halle (Saale) in an investigation against Mayor Dr. Bernd Wiegand. (pdf) Halle Public Prosecutor's Office, February 22, 2021, accessed on February 22, 2021 .
  35. ↑ Dr Bernd Wieg: Legal opinion proves lawful action in dealing with vaccine residues. In: Bernd Wiegand. March 19, 2021, accessed March 20, 2021 .
  36. ↑ Thomas Rönnau: Legal opinion on the discussion of criminal law issues in connection with the administration of vaccine residues in the vaccination centers of the city of Halle (Saale). Bernd Wiegand, p. 34ff , accessed on March 20, 2021 .
  37. ↑ Impfaffäre Hall: report of the public prosecutor charged the mayor. April 6, 2021, accessed April 7, 2021 .
  38. ↑ Hendrik Lasch: Broken relationship. In Halle the mayor and city council often clash. In: Neues Deutschland from January 5, 2016, p. 13
personal data
SURNAME Wiegand, Bernd
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German local politician (non-party, formerly SPD)
DATE OF BIRTH February 23, 1957
PLACE OF BIRTH Braunschweig