Berlin: Police use carpets so as not to offend Muslims during a raid

The police are again on behalf of the Berlin public prosecutor's office against suspected Covid emergency fraud. On Wednesday morning 90 police officers searched the premises and an apartment of Furkan eV on Glasower Straße (Neukölln district) and confiscated evidence.

Officials of the technical operation unit forcibly opened doors, LKA investigators searched the objects. In order not to enter the prayer rooms on shoes and thereby hurt religious feelings, the police brought tiled carpets with them, which were rolled out in the rooms beforehand.

A police spokesman told BZ-Berlin: "We are investigating a 35-year-old person in charge of the association who is said to have applied for unjustified help in April." According to its own information, the association offers a language and Koran teachings, excursions, pastoral care and other religious projects on the Internet Pilgrimages to Mecca.

According to the Berliner Morgenpost, the Berlin police already founded their own investigation group in June, which only wants to investigate fraud with Covid emergency aid by right-wing and Islamist extremists. Eight officers worked in the unit called “Krone” in the State Criminal Police Office. The number of procedures is in the "upper double-digit range", as a spokesman for the authority said. The Federal Criminal Police Office is assuming tens of thousands of cases of fraud in emergency aid from the federal and state governments. According to the police, there are more than 2100 preliminary investigations in Berlin.

At the beginning of the Covid crisis, Berlin tried to help small businesses and self-employed people as quickly as possible and to secure their existence. Applicants only had to upload their name, company address, ID, tax number and bank details. The claims should only be checked after they have been paid out.

There was a great rush. Originally, the Senate had assumed 100 to 300 million euros. After all, a good 1.8 billion euros from federal and state funds went in the form of grants to small businesses with up to ten employees and to self-employed individuals. Of the 246,000 applications submitted, around 30,000 were rejected.

Source: BZ-Berlin