Former Green Party politician faces 121 charges

Significantly more than two years after the start of investigations against the former leader of the Greens in the Hamburg district of Mitte, the Attorney General of the Hanseatic city has now brought charges against Michael Osterburg. Specifically, according to a statement on Wednesday, he is accused of essentially 121 cases of commercial infidelity, some of which are combined with fraud and forgery. If the indictment is approved as expected, Osterburg will have to answer before the Greater Criminal Chamber of the Hamburg Regional Court. In the announcement by the Hamburg prosecution, they pointed out in bold and underlined that the presumption of innocence applied until the final conclusion of the proceedings.

Osterburg, who has retired from political life, is said to have "used a large amount of funds from the parliamentary group for private purposes" from 2015 to 2019. A total of 34,500 euros was involved. This included hospitality "to which the accused untruthfully attributed faction-related occasions", childcare costs that had not actually arisen and privately purchased commodities. In addition, the accused made various account debits in his favor, and he also had travel and rental car costs reimbursed by the parliamentary group for no reason. Earlier reports had also mentioned a total loss of 70,000 euros and the billing of meal expenses, for which the hosts listed on the invoices could not remember meeting Osterburg.

The Attorney General's Office also addressed the duration of the investigation. The indictment at the regional court is based “on the special scope of the matter”. Since the accused has not yet commented on the allegations, the public prosecutor's office named 162 witnesses and 347 documents as evidence.

The events and the investigation were in the public eye, because Osterburg was one of the best-known local politicians in Hamburg, who was not without controversy in his own party due to his power-conscious demeanor. In addition, he was also the partner of today's Hamburg Senator for Justice Anna Gallina (Green Party) for a longer period of time, and the cases now indicted largely fall within the period of their togetherness. Gallina has always denied knowing anything about the possible machinations. She was also questioned by officers during the course of the investigation. Should the allegations prove true in court, Osterburg could face a prison sentence of between 6 months and up to 10 years if he found particularly serious breaches of trust – this includes commercial breaches of trust.