Crane trader Hans Richter has received a suspended prison sentence of one year for false tax accounting. The 10th Commercial Division of the Regional Court in Bochum, Germany, heard that Richter had avoided paying about DM186,000 ($90,000) by submitting inaccurate tax returns for one of his crane companies, AVG.
Suspension was for two years and further charges of financial irregularities were dropped at the 90 minute hearing on 30 August.
The court took into account Richter’s previous clean record, his poor health and the fact that he is now financially ruined. Richter, aged 59, claims to have lost DM16m ($7.5m) due to the proceedings.
Investigations into Richter’s finances began in November 1999. His banks immediately froze accounts and terminated credit agreements. As a result, his companies, including IKH (Industrievertretung Krane & Hebezeuge) and LZV (Langzeitvermietung), were liquidated within weeks. During the investigation Richter was detained in custody for five months.
Richter told Cranes Today that he will bring criminal proceedings against rival crane trader René Hellmich over an article that appeared last year in a magazine that Hellmich publishes, Kran Magazin. ‘In addition I will initiate a private prosecution claiming certainly DM1m or more,’ he said. The journalist who wrote the article would also be included in the action, he said.
Richter is back in the crane trading business working for KMS, formed last year by Karl Kemper. An attempt to resurrect the business of IKH through a property company, IMHA, was last year was abandoned in favour of operating through Kemper’s company. ‘The international business formerly carried out by IKH is now being advanced in the same or even better form by KMS,’ Richter said.
