In Bosnia-vacation of a family is stolen the car. 4000 Euro ransom demands of a blackmailer on the phone for the car. On the claim, the family is not. The insurance wants to pay for the damages first only partially, since she had not been aware of the ransom demand. She argues: One would be able to turn to a private investigator. The Düsseldorf higher regional court decides now in a landmark judgment: The insurance company needs to pay. the Benedikt Müller, Düsseldorf Benedikt Müller
Benedikt Müller reported Westphalia for the economy editorial office of North Rhine-Westphalia. Grew up in the beautiful Rheingau. Visited the Cologne journalist school for politics and Economics and studied Economics in Cologne. Writes since the autumn of 2015 for the SZ, first of all about real estate topics. Since the summer of 2017, he reported mainly about how the big companies change in the Rhine and Ruhr. Other passions: piano, Church organ, and the SC Freiburg.
In the summer, woke up the father on that night and listened to the sounds of the engine, but he thought nothing of it. Only in the Morning, he saw that his site was stolen from the yard. It happened in Bosnia, the family of the middle Rhine, visited some relatives there. Two days later, then a phone call: If the father is paying 4000 Euro, will he get the BMW back. The Unknown on the phone knew the Details of the car, was apparently the real culprit. But the father did not, agreed the police and the insurance – he saw his car ever again. “It was horrible,” says the 44-Year-old.
four and a half years later, has addressed the higher regional court of Düsseldorf with the car abduction. Because the insurance wanted to settle the loss of the car was about 21 000 Euro – only partially. Finally, the customer of the insurance have told nothing of the ransom money. Maybe he would get the car back, argues the company. However, the judge will see the family in law; the insurance company has withdrawn its appeal on Tuesday.
The first sentence
The case has precedential value: The court has found no Supreme court judgment on hijacked cars, at which it would have. Criminal art of stealing, and against a ransom to return, of which you’ve heard already. But Cars? “The fact that insurers respond to it, too, was previously unknown to us,” says judge Michael Florian ganzert.
In the trial, the Rhineland praised insurance, how carefully the father had traded His son to cut the conversation with the alleged car hijackers, the family informed the authorities in Bosnia and Germany. Only the insurance they told nothing of the ransom demand. You read it only a year and a half later in the investigation file. “The Central charge”, says the lawyer of the company. Because the Insured must always try to avert or at least limit.
Certainly isolated cases
argued with The insurance company that you can turn on in the case, a private investigator from Austria, with contacts to Bosnia. “The procedure is known,” said the responsible administrator, the court listened to as a witness. Although the customer would not have to negotiate with kidnappers, even with the Car. However, since the cooperation with one of the investigators would come, the company is cheaper, acted is the father of gross negligence. The Injured party does not want to be in the newspaper called, out of fear of further thefts.
The property, plant workers acknowledged, however, that there was no default in his company, as one should with such claims to deal. “These are certainly isolated cases,” said the employee. Even today, he question, when he processed the car thefts in the Balkans, not after any ransom demands. Anyway, few victims reported such incidents, says the lawyer of the insurance: “We know that there is a large dark field.” But if the clerk didn’t think of it, then they could not blame their customers than gross negligence, the judge ruled. Therefore, it remains in the judgment of the Düsseldorf court of first instance: The insurance company must pay the customer, only a third of the damage, as originally offered, but also the Rest.
