Did Bernie lie?

[dans79]

was the trial criminal or civil?

in the US you can't get out of a criminal case unless the state says so! Getting out of a criminal case rarely happens, and if it does it's usually because you are going to testify for the state in a different case or something similar.

[bhall II]

How much profit has he gotten out of his initial 50M bribe 9 years ago? A wild guess is more than 150M.

For me, the best part of this whole ordeal is that Ecclestone's lawyer actually recommended that the $100 million fine be used to build a Formula One circuit.

[Sven Thomas, Ecclestone's attorney] also suggested the $100 million could be used by the state of Bavaria to build a formula one track.

"I will propose this -- that they should build a nice circuit," he added.

For some reason, I can easily envision a scenario whereby Bernie profits throughout all aspects of this case, even the "punitive" measure. That's what happens when you clearly have the ability to walk on water, a talent only he and Jesus possess.

[SectorOne]

Read the article and you'll see mention that there is a proviso that allows any defendant to pay a sum to end a trial when certain conditions are met. You can't pull that off in any other country if such a proviso does not exist.

Oh trust me, there´s more then one way to take a skip jail card, regardless of what country it is.

[MOWOG]

in the US you can't get out of a criminal case unless the state says so! Getting out of a criminal case rarely happens, and if it does it's usually because you are going to testify for the state in a different case or something similar.

You can if your are big enough. All the big investment banks and hedge funds have paid significant penalties since 2008 but not one individual has served so much as a day in jail as a result of the massive insider trading and fraud they perpetrated. None were required to admit any wrongdoing. None were called upon to rat out any its trading partners and co-conspirators.

The full weight of the law is reserved for citizens who are poor and often non-white. Them we throw the book at!

[xpensive]

...
in the US you can't get out of a criminal case unless the state says so! Getting out of a criminal case rarely happens, and if it does it's usually because you are going to testify for the state in a different case or something similar.

But if you are OJ Simpson or Robert Blake, you can of course get acquitted, no matter how obvious the case is.

[CBeck113]

How much profit has he gotten out of his initial 50M bribe 9 years ago? A wild guess is more than 150M.

For me, the best part of this whole ordeal is that Ecclestone's lawyer actually recommended that the $100 million fine be used to build a Formula One circuit.

[Sven Thomas, Ecclestone's attorney] also suggested the $100 million could be used by the state of Bavaria to build a formula one track.

"I will propose this -- that they should build a nice circuit," he added.

For some reason, I can easily envision a scenario whereby Bernie profits throughout all aspects of this case, even the "punitive" measure. That's what happens when you clearly have the ability to walk on water, a talent only he and Jesus possess.

This is a great idea [says the American who's been living in Bavaria for the past 20 years]! I can highly recommend the Regensburg area - and if the US Amry pulls out of Hohenfels and gives the German gov't hundreds of millions of $s for the oil-contaminated ground, they could put the track there. I'll start writing up my CV... [-o<

[thedutchguy]

I don't really get what happened here?

Before the trial started, Ecclestone said there would be no way that he would go for a settlement. I haven't followed the trial closely, but from what I read, things were going rather well in court for Ecclestone... But out of the blue, he now offers (and gets) a $100 million deal to get out of it?

Three questions about this:

-Why did offer the deal now (presuming the trial was going rather well for him) and not before trial?
-Since this practically puts a bih 'GUILTY' sign on his head, will the big manufactures like Mercedes pressure him to step down?
-What the f#ck is up with the German legal system? Rich people can throw money at the court to walk away free from a crimial case?

[autogyro]

I hope I get an invite to the party
I bet it will be fancy dress

[Kiril Varbanov]

I'd like to call this 1% justice.

That's a good business model. Let's say you are the local governor of province X. You change your local laws to include a "financial bail-out option, proportion of your wealth". Your local court then becomes attractive place for all rich arrogant people who want to pay and go. Everybody will be willing to have their cases reviewed or transferred in your province's court.
Finally, your province is really well-settled, it has pretty much everything in place. Because you earn a lot. Something like Monaco model for tax-payers. I'm heading to my local mayor's office...

[Andres125sx]

It is interesting that everyone seems to see this the same way - nothing more than a bribe.

I have just finished a little light summer reading - a book entitled "The Divide - American injustice in the age of the wealth gap." The book details in exquisite detail how the American justice system, so called, has switched at the highest levels, that being Attorney General Eric Holder himself, from a mechanism that seeks to punish criminal behavior with traditional criminal penalties like serving time in jail to simply collecting fines which are usually a mere shadow of the ill gotten gains from the criminal enterprise.

Referring to the great financail meltdown of 2008, during which trillions were siphoned off into the pockets of a small group of top executives, the Justice Department trumpeted that it had recovered record fines for such wrong doing. Those fines, large as they were, still represented less than 5% of the money stolen.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, the poor have been subjected to a stepped up campaign of police harassment leading to draconian judicial punishments out of all proportion to the purported crimes committed. It reminds me of the good old days when the dregs of English society were deported to Australia for the sin of stealing a crust of bread or eating a pear hanging from a tree in the royal forest.

In other words, society has once again found a way to make us all little more than feudal era vassals who are expected to bend the knee of obeissance to our masters. The only difference is that now those masters are not monarchs but rather faceless corporate entities that operate on a global basis unchecked by virtually any legal restraints whatsoever.

Welcome to the new MIddle Ages. Are we on our way to the new Dark Ages as well?

Upvoted

It´s the boiling frog syndrome

We need to wake up, but I guess we live too comfortably to bother

[MOWOG]

We need to wake up, but I guess we live too comfortably to bother

I want my MTV!

Anyway, thank you kind sir. Pretty sure you are the kind of person who would enjoy the heck out of that book.

There are two kinds of revolutions. One in which the invader storms the gates and batters them down with expensive, high tech war machines like catapults and scaling ladders. The second is when the citizens rush to the gates, unlock them and beg the invaders to please come inside and do as they please.

Which one do you think is going on at the moment?

I read where a few commentators in Germany have expressed dismay at the outcome, but it is now clear that "too big to jail" has gone global. Multi-nationals (and Bernie is certainly one of those) can know proceed to rape and pillage at will, knowing the worst that can happen is that they may, as some point in time, have to pay a pittance to established authority in exchange for their plunder. The going rate seems to be right about 5%.

Would you pay a $1,000,000 fine if you knew you stood to gain $20,000,000? Oh, yeah. You betcha!

And that's assuming you get caught in the act of committing your nefarious activities.

[turbof1]

I'd like to call this 1% justice.

That's a good business model. Let's say you are the local governor of province X. You change your local laws to include a "financial bail-out option, proportion of your wealth". Your local court then becomes attractive place for all rich arrogant people who want to pay and go. Everybody will be willing to have their cases reviewed or transferred in your province's court.
Finally, your province is really well-settled, it has pretty much everything in place. Because you earn a lot. Something like Monaco model for tax-payers. I'm heading to my local mayor's office...

It's a good business model only on the short term. Eventually this model will lead to severe financial losses to companies (who are victim of loosing out on good deals due bribery) and governments, across the globe. That will result in governments and organisations putting huge pressure and financial ramifications on the country that allows such a model. They'll eventually give that up and suddenly those persons are left very vulnerable. Bernie for instance isn't declared innocent or guilty, a sort of justifical limbo. When Germany will be forced to lift their 'paying out of court' precedence, it'll mean Bernie no longer isn't protected anymore with the 'non-verdict', and they can sue him again. Well, chances are this will never happen because he'll most likely be in his grave by then.

It can be at best be compared with Swiss banks. Since the Middle ages they had that strict bank secrecy, but the last decades Europe and especially America have been applying ever increasing pressure. Or to put it better: since FATCA came into effect 2 years ago, a centuries-old policy got toppled, within 2 years.

Things like this will eventually be a victim of their own succes. Monaco and others like the Isle of Man (a very, very underesitmated tax haven) will eventually break to that same logic.

[Pierce89]

How much profit has he gotten out of his initial 50M bribe 9 years ago? A wild guess is more than 150M.

For me, the best part of this whole ordeal is that Ecclestone's lawyer actually recommended that the $100 million fine be used to build a Formula One circuit.

[Sven Thomas, Ecclestone's attorney] also suggested the $100 million could be used by the state of Bavaria to build a formula one track.

"I will propose this -- that they should build a nice circuit," he added.

For some reason, I can easily envision a scenario whereby Bernie profits throughout all aspects of this case, even the "punitive" measure. That's what happens when you clearly have the ability to walk on water, a talent only he and Jesus possess.

This is a great idea [says the American who's been living in Bavaria for the past 20 years]! I can highly recommend the Regensburg area - and if the US Amry pulls out of Hohenfels and gives the German gov't hundreds of millions of $s for the oil-contaminated ground, they could put the track there. I'll start writing up my CV... [-o<

No offense, but as another American with extensive time in Bavaria, the Garmisch-Partenkirchen area would be much better for a track as its easily the most beautiful part of Bavaria and its already a tourist area.

[Aesto]

People in here need to calm WAY down and look at this a little more dispassionately. Ecclestone didn't pay 100 million to avoid going to jail, he paid 100 million to avoid having to deal with the court case for a few months, followed by an acquittal. The prosecutors only go for deals like that if they don't see a realistic chance of getting a conviction. Netting the Bavarian state 100 million may be nice, but putting a big fish like Ecclestone behind bars - WAY better for your career. They had plenty of incentives to go after Ecclestone, but since the case was going so well for him, they basically just cut their losses and got the best possible outcome for the Bavarian state they could still hope to get at that stage.

Second, there seem to be some misunderstandings about the law behind this. For one, it doesn't apply to more serious crimes such as murder, wrongful death, etc. So you can't compare this to OJ Simpson. Additionally, REGULAR CITIZENS CAN ALSO BENEFIT FROM THIS LAW. The amount paid simply depends on the wealth of the defendant. This means that Ecclestone has to pay 100m, but your next-door neighbor could get out of the same situation with only a few thousand euros. So the image some people here are conjuring up of Germany turning into some kind of oligarchy is utterly ridiculous.

Third, compared to most other Western countries Germany actually has a really good justice system. The Supreme Court isn't politicized like in the US and at least attempts to always put the citizens first. Second, there are no juries, which turn the justice system into a popularity contest rather an objective inquest. Like any country Germany has many flaws, but compared to some other stuff, the justice system doesn't even make it onto the list.

[smellybeard]

Did Bernie lie?
I don't know. I don't see how it makes any difference. He's back at work.

On a personal note - Thirty-odd years ago Bernie took me down the pit lane in Brands Hatch - practically by the hand and introduced me to half a dozen team managers, designers and the like. Frank Williams, Jean Sage, Brian Hart and Tony Southgate have stuck in my mind. If that isn't looking after a fan, I don't know what is. He was a personable and chatty to me as he would be the dignitaries walking about on any exotic grid these days.

It is beyond my ability to say anything bad about the man.