law bought? – Causa private clinic: second edition against Strache

15 months probation for Strache for bribery and 12 months probation for Grubmüller for bribery. The Vienna Regional Court made these judgments in the first legal proceedings against the politician and the operator of a private clinic. The latter allegedly paid 12,000 euros in party donations to the FPÖ in 2016 and 2017, so that his clinic would be included in the financing fund for private hospitals (Prikraf). With the money that made this possible, he would have bought a law. Strache is said to have campaigned for this in his position as an opposition MP.

Judgment “contradictory and incomprehensible”
These first verdicts were overturned in the summer of 2022 by the Vienna Higher Regional Court. In some parts they are “contradictory and incomprehensible”. In addition, some exculpatory chat messages received insufficient credit as evidence. So the procedure must be performed again.

With great media attention, Strache and Grubmüller take their place in the dock before Judge Helene Gnida at the Vienna Regional Court. They also plead “not guilty” in the second legal process.

After reading the first verdict and the decision of the OLG Vienna. “Of course it is always toxic when officials work for their friends. It is now necessary to clarify whether Strache only wanted to clear a general complaint or whether he complied with his friend’s demands,” the prosecutor explained at the beginning of the trial.

“My client is a victim”
However, the lawyer of the first accused Grubmüller makes it clear: “My client is a victim. He didn’t buy a law. Then came a law that has absolutely no benefit to my client. The question is therefore whether she is a member of the fund.

Strache’s lawyer Johann Pauer waived his opening speech.

SPÖ veteran donates to FPÖ?
The interrogation of the suspect proceeds relatively quickly. It uses the pre-existing statements from the first trial a year ago. Judge Gnida still has questions for Walter Grubmüller: “It is unusual for such a SPÖ veteran to donate to the FPÖ.” The operator of the private clinic has been a member of the SPÖ since 1969.

“Strict Bill, Good Friends”
The reason for the party donations and support to the Freedom Party is said to have been pure conviction: “The FPÖ was the only party that could have discovered how corrupt the ÖVP is,” said Grubmüller. It would have been the People’s Party that demanded money from him for admission to the Prikraf. They would have demanded 50,000 euros from him. Strache and he, on the other hand, conducted their friendship under the motto “Strict billing, good friends,” Grubmüller explains. He declined to answer questions from the public prosecutor’s office. Everything would be in the act anyway.

Chat messages are not appreciated enough
After an hour, the second suspect, Heinz-Christian Strache, was sitting in the middle of the courtroom. The main subject of the investigation are those chat messages that, according to the Higher Regional Court of Vienna, were not recognized remarkably enough. The ex-Vice-Chancellor says: “That may not have been a happy wording.”

But he does not want to be guilty of bribery. “I had no influence over Johannes Hübner or Dagmar Belakowitsch. I just requested a legal review of the Prikraf,” Strache said. And that would also have affected the lawyer and then MP Hübner and Belakowitsch, the FPÖ’s health spokeswoman. be called as witnesses.

The former FPÖ leader sporadically answers questions from the prosecutor. However, he wants to make it clear: “We’ve been pursuing a free program based on belief — and we’ve never based it on donations.”

Lawyer Hübner on the witness stand
This is also confirmed by Johannes Hübner on the witness stand and by the prosecutor’s office. “How many times have you spoken to Strache about Prikraf,” the prosecutors want to know. “Two or three times I feel like it. That was certainly not a central point in politics. But I saw it as important because there was a problem there,” said Hübner. He knew nothing about the alleged bribery or corruption.

Surprised by the intensity of Strache
FPÖ health spokeswoman Dagmar Belakowitsch recalls Hübner approaching her in a club meeting: “It was about opening Prikrafs to everyone.” The subject of the witness examination is also a press conference on corruption in health care, which the FPÖ held in 2017. “It was one of the most unusual press conferences because not everyone spoke. Normally health problems are something completely different. It’s about hospitals, not directly about health,” Belakowitsch said at the first major hearing in 2021. She would also have been surprised by the intensity with which Strache campaigned on this fringe issue.

‘Walter Grubmüller kept writing emails’
She would have had nothing directly to do with the further procedure to open the Prikraf to all clinics. “Mr. Hübner then took over from me. That was a bit too complicated for me legally,” says the health spokeswoman on the witness stand. Strache would not have played a guiding role in the creation of the Prikraf law, but: “Walter Grubmüller continued to write emails until someone picked up the subject.”