Crime scene: blood diamonds

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Episode of the series Tatort
Original title Blood diamonds
Country of production Germany
original language German
Production
company		 WDR
length 88 minutes
classification Episode 620 ( List )
First broadcast January 15, 2006 on Das Erste
Rod
Director Martin Eigler
script Sönke Lars Neuwöhner ,
Sven S. Poser
production Anke Scheib ,
Christian Granderath
music Johannes Kobilke
camera Martin Kukula
cut Dora Vajda
occupation

Blood diamonds is a television film from the crime series Tatort . The contribution produced by WDR was broadcast on January 15, 2006 in the first program of ARD . It is the 33rd case of the investigative team Max Ballauf and Freddy Schenk and the 620th crime scene episode.

action

The jeweler Karl de Mestre gives a festive reception for his company anniversary. The festival is, however, disrupted by anti-globalization activist group "Underworld", who accuse de Mestre of trading in so-called "blood diamonds". The activists only handle dummies of machine guns, but suddenly a shot is fired and one of the activists, André Hesse, collapses dead. The dead was shot with a 9 mm projectile, which is also used by the police. During interrogation, the activists said that they suspected de Mestre of having one of his security guards shot at Hesse. Ballauf and Schenk questioned the colleagues who were there and the security personnel from de Mestre, who, however, are not carrying any weapons. De Mestre says that his accountant Mekele was murdered in South Africa a week ago . The activists accuse him, however, that this murder was in his interest and possibly also on his behalf, because Mekele wanted to testify against his boss, but his murder did not lead to it. The officers then request the relevant files from their colleagues in South Africa.

Ballauf and Schenk visit the activists again. Heiner Matzek, their leader, shows the two of them a video that shows de Mestre's distribution channels from the Congo to South Africa. However, no definitive evidence against de Mestre can be documented with it. On the video they discover the Belgian mercenary Siemers, who was also seen on surveillance videos from de Mestre's gallery. According to the activists, Siemers had been fired from de Mestre and hates him. The commissioners then check Jan Siemers. Based on the files of Interpol , Siemers was with the army and the police in Belgium, after his release there he became a mercenary and worked in the diamond trade in southern Africa. In addition, Siemers is being investigated in South Africa for the murder of Mekele.

Ballauf and Schenk go to the diamond trading center in Antwerp to explore de Mestres and Siemers' connections. A car that Siemers had rented was handed in there the day before. In Antwerp the two meet Julia Ruiter, she was a “tourist” in de Mestre's gallery during the attack, but is a colleague of the Antwerp criminal police. She claims to have investigated Siemers, to have been stopped by the upper level, and to continue investigating on her own.

Siemers contacts the activist Heiner Matzek and announces that he will testify against de Mestre. Matzek then meets with Siemers in Antwerp and gives him money for evidence. Siemers accuses him of first rousing de Mestre with the action in Africa. He would get everyone out of the way who was there. Siemers then speaks in front of the camera about his work for de Mestre and its connections to the international arms trade. Siemers had tried to blackmail de Mestre, so the two fell out.

Ballauf and Schenk find out through the rental car company that Siemers must have driven into the port area; after a short search they find its hiding place in a factory building. Siemers has finished the interview with Matzek and is about to move abroad when he is killed by a killer. Ballauf and Schenk watch the murder and are hunted by the killer themselves. Since they are unofficially in Antwerp, they do not have their service weapons with them. The killer tries to kill Schenk, but Ballauf overpowers him. When the Belgian colleague Ruiter arrives, the man can be arrested. Ballauf finds a 9 mm weapon in Siemers' trailer. The check shows that André Hesse was murdered with this, but not Mekele in South Africa.

Back in Cologne, the police search the private and business premises of de Mestre, Schenk is certain that he commissioned the murders of his two former employees and André Hesse. Ballauf, on the other hand, doubts de Mestre's guilt and believes that Schenk is getting lost in something. Ballauf seeks out Hesse's girlfriend, who got off at "Underworld". She says that Matzek is not about people, but only about winning in the cause, he doesn't care about anything else. Matzek's friend Celine discovers a video of a scheduled interview with Mekele. Here he is supposed to testify for what he had already received money from Matzek, but he refuses. Celine sees Matzek shoot Mekele in front of the camera. When her boyfriend suddenly comes in, he only says that Mekele was corrupt and unscrupulous and that she didn't deserve better. Hesse had wanted to testify about the murder of Mekele, so he would have shot him too.

Meanwhile, Ballauf finds out that the weapon with which Hesse was shot was stolen from the Bundeswehr ten years earlier. So Hesse was shot with his own gun. Only Matzek could have slipped this weapon on Siemers' visit to Antwerp. Ballauf and Schenk immediately go to Matzek, who lets himself be arrested without resistance.

With the help of the Antwerp police, a connection between de Mestre's most important business partner and Siemers can be proven, so that in the end de Mestre is responsible for the murder of Siemers.

background

The film was shot from April 5, 2005 to May 4, 2005 in Cologne and Antwerp.

reception

Reviews

Feridun Zaimoglu from Die Zeit is positive about the crime scene and writes:

“The Cologne police arrest the murderer, of course. No assassin escapes them - it would be wrong to view their success rate as a constant in the script. They are a great team, they play so well that we are tempted to move to Cologne every episode. "

- Feridun Zaimoglu : The time

At Tittelbach.tv you can read:

“'Blutdiamanten' 2006 was a throwback to those years when the WDR 'Tatort' in Cologne wanted to improve the world. The authors Sönke Lars Neuwöhner & Sven Poser are not the first to discover the illegal business with illegal 'stones' as a cinematic subject. The book is in the best of hands with director Martin Eigler. Without idling! "

- Tilmann P. Gangloff : Tittelbach.tv

Audience ratings

The first broadcast of blood diamonds on January 15, 2006 was seen by 8.34 million viewers in Germany and achieved a market share of 21.6% for Das Erste .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Crime scene: blood diamonds at crew united . Retrieved January 7, 2019.
  2. ↑ Feridun Zaimoglu: Blood diamonds. In: The time. December 18, 2009, accessed January 6, 2019 .
  3. ↑ Tilmann P. Gangloff: Series "Tatort - Blood Diamonds". In: Tittelbach.tv . 2006, accessed January 6, 2019 .
  4. ↑ blood diamonds. In: Tatort-Fundus.de . Retrieved January 6, 2019 .
previous episode
January 1, 2006: Solar eclipse 		Crime scene follow next episode
January 22, 2006: Black Heart