Martin Porwoll

Martin Porwoll (born August 25, 1971 in Bottrop ) is a German whistleblower .

The economist Porwoll became known through the gathering of evidence about the illegal use of cytostatics (anti-cancer drugs ) in the old pharmacy in Bottrop ( medical scandal Alte Apotheke Bottrop ), where illegal panhandling was practiced for years and several thousand seriously and often terminally ill cancer patients were harmed are. Martin Porwoll had been hired as an economist, had known the owner personally since childhood and had been the commercial manager of the large pharmacy with around 70 employees since 2014. He had compared the numbers between the actually delivered and billed active ingredients and filed a complaint with meticulously collected evidence. Nevertheless, he had to continue to work inconspicuously for months until the public prosecutor was finally ready to act. At the same time, he knew for a long time about the patient's risk of death and had to talk to the private patients among them without being allowed to reveal anything of his knowledge. This state of affairs was very bad for his health. He was temporarily unable to drive a car and had “manifest panic disorders”. His wife and grown children also knew and stood by him with confidence. The owner was comparatively certain that he could not be exposed, as an identical criminal complaint against him from patient circles in 2014, which was only made on suspicion without being able to provide relevant evidence, had completely fizzled out. On the same day the police attacked on November 29, 2016, Porwoll was "released without notice". When asked, he said he would do everything again even after experiencing the personal disadvantages.

In 2017, Martin Porwoll was awarded the Whistleblower Prize of the Association of German Scientists together with Maria-Elisabeth Klein and Can Dündar .

At the end of November 2019, Porwoll presented his whistleblower experience to the general public in the SWR's “night café” .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} "Committed to the truth?" , SWR “Nachtcafé” from November 29, 2019, accessed December 1, 2019
2. ↑ Whistleblower Prize Winner - VDW e. V.
3. ↑ Deiseroth, Dieter, Graßl, Hartmut ,: Whistleblower revelations on anti-cancer drug scams and illegal arms deals: Whistleblower Prize 2017 . Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-8305-2129-7 .