Economic and Corruption Prosecutor's Office

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The Economic and Corruption Prosecutor's Office (WKSTA) (officially: Central Prosecutor's Office for prosecution of criminal cases economy and corruption ) is in Austria a special prosecutor based in Vienna . The specialized public prosecutor's office is responsible nationwide for all of the offenses listed in a separate catalog of offenses, from the preliminary investigation to the indictment and the main proceedings to the appeal proceedings before the Higher Regional Court. The head of the WKStA has been Ilse-Maria Vrabl-Sanda since December 2012.

Together with the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and the Fight against Terrorism, the WKStA operates an anonymous whistleblower system to fight corruption.

history

The WKStA was founded on January 1st, 2009. On September 1, 2011, it was converted into the new law enforcement agency that now exists in order to be able to act in economic criminal matters in addition to corruption .

organization

As of August 2018, there are 40 public prosecutors working at the WKStA. 13 of them are experts from the financial, economic and IT sectors (currently 13 in total).

Responsibilities

The WKSTA is responsible for the following offenses:

  • Embezzlement, serious or commercially serious fraud, fraudulent data processing abuse, breach of trust, misuse of funding and fraudulent crime (insofar as the damage caused by the offense exceeds 5 million euros or such an offense was attempted)
  • Fraudulent registration with social security or construction workers' vacation and severance pay fund (if the withheld contributions or surcharges exceed 5 million euros or such an offense was attempted)
  • Organized undeclared work
  • Grossly negligent impairment of the interests of creditors (loss of satisfaction more than 5 million euros or damage to the economic existence of many people)
  • Chain and pyramid games (for severe damage to a large number of people)
  • Acceptance of gifts by those in power, anti-competitive agreements in awarding procedures and if the act was committed in relation to an advantage exceeding 3,000 euros Bribery, acceptance of advantages, acceptance of advantages to influence, bribery, allocation of advantages, allocation of advantages to influence, prohibited intervention, acceptance of gifts and bribery of employees (employees or agents) as well as if such an offense was attempted)
  • Unjustifiable presentation of essential information about associations and unjustifiable reports from auditors of certain associations ("accounting fraud"), offenses under the Real Estate Investment Fund Act, Investment Fund Act, Capital Market Act (if the company concerned has a share capital of at least 5 million euros or more than 2,000 employees )
  • Procedure according to the Stock Exchange Act ("insider trading")
  • Procedure in accordance with the Electricity Industry and Organization Act (ElWOG) 2010 and the Gas Industry Act (GWG) 2011
  • Financial misdemeanors if the value determining the criminal offense exceeds 5 million euros
  • Money laundering related to the above crimes
  • Criminal association or organization related to the above offenses
  • Legal assistance in connection with the above criminal offenses

Cooperation with police authorities and public prosecutors

The police must report any corruption cases to the WKStA immediately. If there is no particular public interest in a case, the WKStA can transfer the proceedings to the locally responsible public prosecutor's office. The connection piece to the police is the Federal Office for the Prevention and Fight against Corruption (BAK), which replaced the Office for Internal Affairs on January 1, 2010 . In the case of the Ibiza investigation , however, it was not the BAK that was commissioned with the investigation , but the so-called Soko Tape (Soko Ibiza) of the Federal Criminal Police Office .

Reporting requirement

In contrast to other public prosecutors' offices, the WKStA was initially only subject to a limited reporting obligation to the Vienna Public Prosecutor in cases of public interest or unresolved legal issues, namely only when deciding on charges or discontinuation, but not on the occurrence or individual steps in the investigation. Originally it was thought that the KStA would also be free to issue instructions, direct subordination to the Ministry of Justice and a leniency program , but this did not materialize.

After a controversial approval of a house search promoted by the Ministry of the Interior under Herbert Kickl in the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and Combating Terrorism (see BVT affair ) in February 2018, the then Justice Minister Josef Moser (ÖVP) also introduced a reporting obligation for the WKStA. Since then, the authority has had to submit a project report to the Vienna Public Prosecutor three days before each significant step in the investigation, which is forwarded to the Ministry of Justice on the basis of the OStA Vienna’s obligation to issue instructions. The opposition repeatedly called for the WKStA's reporting obligation to be abolished in order to prevent possible advance information (e.g. about planned house searches) from being passed on to the political leadership. In 2019, almost every second preliminary investigation had to be reported.

Current investigations

The WKStA is currently investigating numerous explosive cases, including in the Ibiza affair around the former Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache ( FPÖ ) and the former FPÖ club chairman Johann Gudenus , in the casino affair against the former finance ministers Josef Pröll (ÖVP) and Hartwig Löger (ÖVP), against the incumbent Finance Minister Gernot Blümel and against Raiffeisen managers and the head of Österreichische Beteiligungs AG (ÖBAG). In the meantime, the WKStA is also investigating Chancellor Sebastian Kurz and his head of cabinet Bernhard Bonelli , both of whom are accused of making false statements in the Ibiza committee of inquiry .

The WKStA also investigated the so-called shredder affair involving the destruction of hard drives by the Federal Chancellery shortly after the Ibiza video was published, until the Vienna Public Prosecutor's Office withdrew the case against its will.

Dirty campaigning

In the course of the Ibiza committee of inquiry , it became known that the head of the Vienna Public Prosecutor's Office, Josef Fuchs, and the top official in the Justice Ministry, Christian Pilnacek, were thinking in evening emails about how the WKStA could be harmed by the media. In addition, a document with a watermark of the ÖVP emerged, which was distributed to journalists in order to operate undercover "dirty campaigning" against the WKStA. Investigations into false statements before the Ibiza committee of inquiry were also launched against Fuchs and Pilnacek at the beginning of 2021.

Report against a journalist

In a broadcast, the ORF editorial board and other journalists sharply opposed the threat to the “press” editor Anna Thalhammer from employees of the business and corruption prosecutor and the report by the business and corruption prosecutor (WKStA). The journalist was with one Crimes have been reported that are threatened with up to five years in prison. The ORF editors' council and other journalists see this as a massive attack on freedom of the press in Austria. The threat of imprisonment for critical reporting on state organs is not provided for in democratic countries for good reason. Unpleasant reporting should not lead to personal repression against journalists. Media law would have offered enough opportunities with which these chief public prosecutors of the business and corruption prosecutor's office could have defended themselves if the reports in the daily newspaper “Die Presse” had been incorrect or dishonorable from their point of view. This procedure is also common in a constitutional state. The personal intimidation of an individual editor with advertisements for defamation, defamation and “public insult to an authority”, on the other hand, appear to the ORF editorial board as an attempt to hinder a critical journalist in her work and ultimately to silence the independent press. The fact that the Vienna Public Prosecutor's Office could not even recognize an initial suspicion and therefore put the complaint back shows that trust in the Austrian constitutional state is in itself justified.

Due to the massive criticism, the Economic and Corruption Prosecutor's Office admitted that these reports were a mistake and that they will not be repeated. For the interim Minister of Justice Werner Kogler (Greens), the Economic and Corruption Prosecutor's Office (WKStA) has “crossed a red line” with these reports against a “press” journalist.

management

Previous head of the WKStA:

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b General information , on justiz.gv.at
  2. ↑ a b c Ilse-Maria Vrabl-Sanda, Austria's new corruption hunter. In: Wiener Zeitung . November 30, 2012, accessed February 8, 2020 .
  3. ↑ Help us to solve serious crimes in the area of white- collar crime and corruption! We keep your anonymity. , on bkms-system.net
  4. ↑ Manfred Seeh: model public prosecutor as a lone corruption hunter ( memento from January 2, 2017 in the Internet Archive ). In: The press . October 9, 2008, accessed March 8, 2020.
  5. ↑ Responsibility , on justiz.gv.at
  6. ↑ Dispute about mandatory reporting , Wienerzeitung of April 11, 2019
  7. ↑ a b Duty to report to the ministry lengthens investigations , Kurier dated April 11, 2019
  8. ^ U Committee - SPÖ, NEOS and FPÖ demand the abolition of the three-day reporting obligation of the WKStA to the OStA , on ots.at
  9. ↑ The WKStA accuses Kurz of having given false statements three times. Retrieved May 13, 2021 (Austrian German).
  10. ↑ The Chief Public Prosecutor did not want the shredding act to go to U Committee , Der Standard dated June 27, 2020
  11. ↑ How the WKStA got into the crosshairs of ÖVP and superiors , Der Standard from January 22, 2021
  12. ↑ Corruption hunter sees "unobjective attacks" , Wiener Zeitung of July 16, 2020
  13. ↑ Opposition demands suspensions , on orf.at
  14. ↑ ORF editorial board condemns complaint against journalist , website: APA-OTS from January 20, 2021.
  15. ↑ Corruption prosecutors reported the journalist for defamation , website: derStandard.at from January 17, 2021.
  16. ↑ Criminal justice against journalistic clarification: What should this be or become? , Website: APA-OTS from January 20, 2021.
  17. ↑ the prosecutor reports the journalist , website: Falter.at from January 20, 2021.
  18. ↑ Corruption prosecutors reported a journalist , website: medianet.at from January 20, 2021.
  19. ↑ Kogler criticizes WKStA advertisement against journalist , website: orf.at of January 24, 2021.