Spying Affair
March 13, 2009
The prosecutor's office in Bonn announced that it had raided Deutsche Post headquarters on Friday, March 13, as well as the residence of Zumwinkel and former Deutsche Telekom CEO Kai-Uwe Ricke.
According to Deutsche Post spokesperson Silje Skogstad, "no documents were seized" during the raid at Deutsche Post and the company is "not opposed to the investigation."
Klaus Zumwinkel, who was the Chief of the Board of Directors at Deutsche Telekom at the same as he was CEO of the sister company Deutsche Post, is at the center of investigations. Zumwinkel has already faced tax evasion charges which resulted in a suspended sentence of two years and a financial punishment of one million euros ($1.29 million).
In mid-May 2008, Deutsche Telekom announced they were launching an internal investigation into a data scandal. During 2005 and 2006, approximately 65 people including the formal Human Resources CEO Heinz Klinkhammer, board members and journalists were allegedly spied on. The purpose of the spying was reportedly to prevent the release of internal data to the public.
Senior prosecutor Friedrich Apostel has revealed that eight suspects are being investigated in the matter, with Zumwinkel and former Deutsche Telekom CEO Ricke at the center of the investigation
Ricke's residence in Switzerland was raided and his wife's house in Bavaria was also searched. Zumwinkel's former villa in Cologne as well as his house on Italy's Lake Garda were also searched. Two computers were seized from his Italian home.
Spying affair had wide scope
According to a speaker for the former Deutsche Post CEO, Zumwinkel has been cooperating with investigators for months.
Rene Obermann, the current CEO of Deutsche Telekom, has vowed that he had no prior knowledge of the data abuse scandal at the company in the previous years.
In the affair, Deutsche Telekom security monitored telephone calls made by journalists and board members, as well as other data.
A former employee from the security department who allegedly organized the spying affair has already been detained.