Franjo Pooth

Franjo Pooth (2013)

Franz-Josef "Franjo" Pooth (born July 20, 1969 ) is a former German entrepreneur . He gained fame through his marriage to the German entertainer Verona Pooth , b. Feldbusch, in 2004, whose life partner he has been since 2000.

Origin, education and occupation

Pooth comes from Meerbusch-Büderich and is the son of the Düsseldorf architect Franz-Josef Pooth. He has a brother named Mano Pooth. Franjo Pooth attended the municipal Mataré grammar school in Meerbusch and the boarding school of the Otto Kühne School in Bonn-Bad Godesberg . He broke off studying architecture after ten semesters without a degree. After completing his studies, he worked in Cologne at Firstgate Internet AG and at the communications agency Innovum.

Entrepreneurship and bankruptcy

Maxfield company logo

In 2003 Pooth founded Maxfield GmbH, which mainly sold MP3 players . Pooth headed the company in the founding phase as managing director . He drew attention to Maxfield through appearances on talk shows and in the tabloids - sometimes together with his wife. In 2005 the company increased its annual turnover by 250 percent to 35 million euros. In 2006, Pooth was a finalist in the “ Entrepreneur of the Year ” competition organized by the auditing firm Ernst & Young . "Only one year after it was founded, Maxfield is overtaking well-known major manufacturers," said the jury in its statement.

At the beginning of 2008, Maxfield GmbH had to file for bankruptcy due to excessive indebtedness , and 27 employees lost their jobs. On February 29, 2008 the bankruptcy proceedings were opened. 461 creditors demanded a total of 27 million euros from the company.

In October 2008, Pooth was sentenced to pay 1.8 million euros to Commerzbank , for which he had privately vouched. Pooth was able to negotiate a settlement with the Stadtsparkasse Düsseldorf , which he had to disclose during a court hearing despite a confidentiality agreement. Although he personally guaranteed most of the debt in the amount of 9.3 million euros, the Sparkasse was satisfied with an offered payment of 820,000 euros due to lack of assets. According to Pooth, this had been received from an unnamed third party.

In 2014 Pooth assigned the naming rights to Maxfield GmbH to a company for inductive charging stations based in Buchen in the Odenwald . This had to file for bankruptcy in 2017.

In July 2015, at the end of the proceedings, the insolvency administrator announced that 19.6 million euros in debt were offset by 2.4 million euros in discoverable capital. Including procedural costs, a further 18 million euros were lost in the company, the remaining creditors lose at least 90.9 percent of their money.

Bribery of the Sparkasse

On the occasion of the bankruptcy it turned out that Pooth had obtained the million dollar loan from Stadtsparkasse Düsseldorf through bribery. The chairman of the board, Heinz-Martin Humme, and board member Karl-Heinz Stiegemann had granted Maxfield the loan of 9.3 million euros despite high debt and warnings from the Sparkasse's board of directors.

Humme was often present in the Pooths' private environment over a long period of time, including playing golf together. He and six other Sparkasse employees attended the wedding of the Pooths in St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna. Verona Pooth claimed in an RTL interview that her husband had the talent "to wrap bankers around his fingers". A member of the Sparkasse's board of directors publicly suspected that the loan had been granted too lightly due to the “Verona factor”.

Franjo Pooth confessed to having bribed Humme and Stiegemann with high-quality televisions from the luxury brand Bang & Olufsen valued at over 9,000 euros. In his defense, he accused at least one board member of coercing him to do so. Stiegemann later admitted that he had requested personal benefits and, in return, deliberately granted the credit despite the credit line that was already overdrawn. After auditors had found incriminating evidence, both Humme and Stiegemann were terminated without notice by the Sparkasse board of directors. Despite the lost million dollar loan, Stiegemann filed a lawsuit for the payment of success bonuses in the amount of 105,000 euros. After his confession, he was sentenced in July 2011 by the Düsseldorf regional court to pay 454,000 euros to his former employer. Overall, the Sparkasse put its damage from the "Pooth Affair" at 25 million euros.

Conviction for economic crime

Franjo Pooth was on 2 March 2009 by the District Court Dusseldorf for granting advantages and bribery in business dealings, also because of infidelity and negligent Insolvenzverschleppung by punishment sentenced to one year probation and to pay 100,000 euros to the insolvency administrator. Since he accepted the penalty order and waived legal remedies, he was spared a public trial. This made the penalty order legally binding and Pooth is considered a criminal record.

In addition to granting benefits to the Sparkasse board members, Pooth was found guilty of bribing a British sales representative with 20,000 euros to favor him over competitors. The court judged the use of almost 16,000 euros from the Maxfield account to renovate his private apartment in London as infidelity. Pooth had kept this a secret from his co-partners and booked the money as an alleged loss of receivables. The delay in bankruptcy was considered negligent because the court saw joint responsibility of the auditing company and the savings bank. They had urged not to file for bankruptcy in order to prevent a scandal.

Pooth's former bodyguard obtained an injunction in court for "defamatory and degrading allegations". Pooth can no longer claim that the bodyguard stole from him and broke into his house. The Pooth couple had indicated that they see the former bodyguard as one of the culprits for their misery. They accused him of selling to the press the documents that sparked the bribery and criminal investigation against Franjo Pooth. The bodyguard then filed a complaint against both spouses for damage to their reputation.

Further employment

Another activity of Franjo Pooth as an entrepreneur is not known. Pooth, sometimes together with his brother Mano, had registered a large number of companies at various addresses, some of whose corporate purpose and activities were not evident and several of which were the subject of public prosecution investigations. As managing director of Lemontree Holding GmbH (formerly Pooth Consult GmbH and HK Consulting Agency GmbH ) he left in September 2011, he was followed by his brother. At other companies at the same address, the brother is also registered as managing director. Since Pooth states that he does not have any capital available to his creditors, he cannot provide the equity required for entrepreneurship in a company.

In March 2014, an RTL television presentation "Verona private - at home with the Pooths" showed how Franjo drives to the office with his ten-year-old son, where he and his brother "run the company". There, father and son are alone and exchange ideas about their relationship.

Private

With Verona Pooth, Franjo Pooth has two sons: San Diego (born September 10, 2003) and Rocco Ernesto (born June 4, 2011). He lives in Meerbusch-Büderich .

In March 2014, the couple presented their private life in an 80-minute documentary on the TV channel RTL.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ The Pooth couple: Big pants in Düsseldorf , Stern , issue 11/2008
2. ^ The bankruptcy by your side , Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger , February 22, 2008
3. ^ Prominent and broke Süddeutsche Zeitung , January 23, 2008.
4. ↑ Entrepreneur of the Year 2006: The Finalists , Manager Magazin , September 22, 2006
5. ^ Insolvency proceedings against Franjo Pooth opened , Die Welt , March 2, 2008
6. ↑ Creditors demand 27 million euros from Pooth ( Memento from August 1, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ), Financial Times Deutschland , May 7, 2008
7. ^ Trial against Commerzbank: Franjo Pooth has to pay , Handelsblatt , October 28, 2008
8. ↑ Sparkasse donates EUR 8.4 million to Franjo , photo Düsseldorf , February 23, 2011
9. ↑ Sparkasse: “There was nothing to be got from Pooth” , Rheinische Post , February 26, 2011
10. ↑ Maxfield again insolvent Channel Observer on May 6, 2017
11. ↑ Franjo Pooth's creditors are left with 17 million euros , Stern , July 2, 2015
12. ↑ Finale in the Pooth affair , Rheinische Post , July 26, 2015
13. ^ Pooth affair: Ex-Sparkasse board member receives suspended sentence , Spiegel Online , March 30, 2011
14. ↑ Sparkasse ohne Glamor ( Memento of the original from July 16, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , February 29, 2008 
15. ↑ Suspicion of unfaithfulness: bank manager has to go because of the "Pooth affair" , Die Welt , February 22, 2008
16. ↑ Bribery allegation against Verona's husband: Sparkasse - you will be helped  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Rheinische Post , February 21, 2008  
17. ↑ Maxfield bankruptcy: Franjo Pooth admits bribery , Spiegel Online , April 6, 2008
18. ^ Pooth affair: Former Sparkasse board member makes confession , Spiegel Online , March 22, 2011
19. ^ Pooth bankruptcy: Dusseldorf Sparkasse boss must vacate posts , Spiegel Online , March 31, 2008
20. ^ Pooth affair: Stiegemann wants success bonus , Rheinische Post , June 12, 2008
21. ↑ Ex-Sparkassen board member has to pay 454,000 euros , Rheinische Post , July 28, 2011
22. ↑ Does the Pooth Affair cost 25 million? , Rheinische Post , September 25, 2010
23. ^ Judgment: Franjo Pooth has to pay one million euros , Spiegel Online , March 2, 2009
24. ↑ Verona Pooth sued by the bodyguard , Stern , January 14, 2009
25. ↑ Pooth conceded defeat n-tv.de , October 1, 2008
26. ↑ Bodyguard dispute: Franjo Pooth conceded defeat in court , Süddeutsche Zeitung , May 17, 2010
27. ↑ The Broken Pooth Empire , Express , May 26, 2008
28. ↑ Lemontree Holding GmbH in the commercial register of Neuss district court, trade register number HRB 13598
29. ↑ Mogoon Estates GmbH in the commercial register of Neuss district court, trade register number HRB 15264
30. ^ Sparkasse Düsseldorf releases Franjo Pooth debts in the millions , Neue Rhein Zeitung , February 25, 2011
31. ↑ Verona and Franjo Pooth in private on RTL, description of the program , Stories Aktuell , March 27, 2014
32. ↑ RTL shows embarrassing scenes at Pooths at home , Die Welt , March 30, 2014

See also

• Stadtsparkasse Düsseldorf: Scandal over Maxfield bankruptcy or Pooth affair