You may know Steinhoff through Fraser Perring because his group Viceroy Research was decisive for the company’s downfall! A German court has issued an arrest warrant against Markus Jooste, the former CEO of the Steinhoff furniture group, formerly the parent company of the now-insolvent Kika and Leiner furniture chains in Austria.
The arrest warrant for Markus Jooste is currently being translated into English, a court spokesman said Thursday. “Decisions regarding the further course of the proceedings are expected to be made in the coming week,” he said.
Jooste had stayed away from the start of the trial in April. His lawyer had explained that his client could not leave the country due to criminal investigations into the accounting scandal against him in South Africa. He said there had been an agreement between Jooste and the South African judiciary since 2017. The court had then initially suspended the trial against Jooste.
The prosecution accuses the former group CEO of instigating balance sheet manipulation amounting to billions of euros. The accounting scandal had severely shaken the retail group, which has its roots in Westerstede in Lower Saxony. The disclosure of manipulations at the end of 2017 almost completely wiped out the company’s stock market value. Steinhoff International Holdings operates globally and is headquartered in Amsterdam and managed from South Africa. Jooste denies the allegations, according to earlier reports.
The execution of the arrest warrant is up to the public prosecutor’s office, according to the court spokesman. The latter would also have to decide whether an extradition request would be made.
