ZCZC
BFF-37
GERMANY-MEDIA-JOURNALISM-SPIEGEL
Spiegel to file criminal complaint against cheating reporter
BERLIN, Dec 23, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Influential German news weekly Der Spiegel
said Sunday it would file a criminal complaint against a disgraced reporter
after it emerged he may have embezzled donations intended for Syrian street
children.
Claas Relotius, 33, resigned this month after admitting to making up
stories and inventing protagonists in more than a dozen articles in the
magazine’s print and online editions.
Spiegel said it now had information that Relotius allegedly launched a
campaign for readers to give money to help subjects of an article he wrote
but that the bank details he gave directed the funds to his own account.
“Der Spiegel will give all the information it collects to public
prosecutors as part of a criminal complaint,” it said on its website.
Spiegel said concerned readers had in recent days reported Relotius’s call
for donations purportedly for orphaned Syrian children living on the streets
of Turkey.
It said it had been unaware of the campaign and that it was not
immediately clear how much money was raised from the appeal, apparently made
by email to readers who contacted him about the story.
Spiegel published the article by Relotius in July 2016 but a Turkish
photographer who worked with him on the piece has since noted significant
inaccuracies.
The magazine said it now believes Relotius may have simply made up one of
the main protagonists, whom the article described as young siblings.
Relotius described his attempts to help the children in a subsequent
collection of articles, including a months-long effort to bring the children
to Germany to be adopted by a family. Spiegel said this also appeared to be a
lie.
In its most recent edition, the magazine said the scam was the “worst thing
that can happen to an editorial team”.
Acknowledging the damage to faith in its own work and the media in
general, it apologised promised to “do everything to boost our credibility
again.”
BSS/AFP/RY/1655 hrs