Das Gericht glaubt René Benko auch beim vierten Mal nicht. Sein einstiger Förderer rechnet mit ihm ab

The Innsbruck Regional Court convicted René Benko again, sentencing him to an additional two years in prison. The trial focused on five million euros, a broken promise, and a golden-plated hunting rifle. After a two-hour discussion, Judge Norbert Hofer announced the verdict: Benko is once again guilty. This time, the crime is serious fraud against the Haselsteiner Family Trust.

Benko now faces a total of four and a half years in prison, in addition to the thirty months he was previously convicted of in September. The case was centered around a notarially sealed guarantee Benko provided to billionaire and construction entrepreneur Hans Peter Haselsteiner on November 6, 2023, just three weeks before the insolvency of his Signa Holding.

The Haselsteiner Family Trust had awarded Signa Development shares for nearly five million euros in 2022. Payments were to be made in half-dividends totaling ten million, but they were postponed and never received. When Sportscheck, a Signa subsidiary, urgently needed five million in the autumn of 2023, the trust transferred the funds against Benko's personal promise to repay the money by the end of June 2024.

However, Benko was also privately insolvent in March 2024. The prosecution argued that the guarantee was "nothing more than a written lie," through which Benko "pulled fresh capital" despite knowing he couldn't pay. The defense maintained that Haselsteiner merely paid a long-overdue debt: the purchase price for the shares was due at the end of 2022, and there was no deception or damage.

The court dismissed their assertion as "complete nonsense": Haselsteiner wanted to save Sportscheck and didn't see any connection to the share purchase, while Benko must have known he couldn't repay the money. The situation was "relatively clear." The second charge, fraudulent conversion, involved a silver-plated pistol with gold-plated initials "RB" belonging to the Signa Holding.

It remained with Benko after the company's insolvency but was not reported to the creditors. The prosecution maintained that Benko tried to sneak luxury goods past the creditors, as he had done in a previous trial. However, the Economic and Corruption Prosecutor's Office did not agree. The trial began on Wednesday with a showdown between former business associates.

Haselsteiner, 82, founder of the Strabag construction group and one of the wealthiest men in Austria, had been involved with Signa since 2013 and was a key supporter of Benko until the company's collapse. When testifying, he said Benko had sworn to repay the money "with all his might," adding that he never imagined Haselsteiner would ask for five million.

Benko countered that if Haselsteiner claimed he had been deceived, "then he is lying"; the industrialist never had the idea to ask for even five million. Haselsteiner stated that he had given Benko "one more week" over the summer of 2024 in a telephone conversation. He said that no one would believe Benko owed five million. Benko, once considered one of the wealthiest men in Austria, is now in pre-trial detention.

Since October, he has been held in a Innsbruck apartment with leg shackles. Benko is convicted only of fraudulent conversion: 300,000 euros for his mother, a prepaid rent for a villa hidden from creditors, and luxury watches. Numerous further investigation complexes remain surrounding the Signa bankruptcy. For the third time, the real estate entrepreneur is being accused of wrongdoing, with investigators focusing on the central question of the Signa bankruptcy.

With Benko's first convicted verdict, prosecutors achieved a significant victory. Two years after the collapse of the Signa group, the search for the Austrian culprit's wealth continues. With the insolvency of the Laura Private Trust, one of his last private reserves has disappeared.