On June 13, 1992, Karstadt received a blackmail letter, shortly afterwards a pipe bomb exploded in a Hamburg branch. Blackmailer "Dagobert" fooled the police for around two years until he was caught in a Berlin phone booth on April 22, 1994.
In June 1992, a strange advertisement appeared in the "Hamburger Abendblatt":"Uncle Dagobert greets his nephews." What sounds like a joke by a staunch Walt Disney fan is a message placed by the Karstadt department store group. The agreed text signals to a blackmailer that the company is willing to pay. In a letter to Karstadt on June 13, the blackmailer demanded one million marks, otherwise he would detonate bombs in the department stores. In fact, the following night he explodes a pipe bomb in the porcelain department of a Hamburg Karstadt branch to emphasize the demand.
Is the blackmailer an old friend?
The police suspect an old acquaintance in the blackmailer. As early as 1988, the Berlin department store KaDeWe was extorted for half a million marks. At that time, too, an explosive device exploded in the department store at night. police officers threw the ransom out of a moving S-Bahn train on the instructions of the blackmailer. Four years later, the same signature:This time, too, the money is to be dropped from a moving train.
Money transfer with technical finesse
In the Karstadt blackmail case in 1992, the perpetrator refined the handover plan. So that he himself can determine the location of the drop, he installs a magnetic metal bracket on a train on the Berlin - Rostock route. The device should be released from the wagon by remote control. After a failed attempt, the magnet detaches as planned on the second attempt. The blackmailer flees with his wallet on a bicycle. But there are only a few bills in the pocket - the rest is filled with scraps of paper.
Cat and mouse game between extortionists and police
The perpetrator is not satisfied with the small sum and insists on his demand. Over the next two years, "Dagobert" - as the perpetrator is now called by the press on the basis of the first newspaper ad - engaged in a cat-and-mouse game with the police. With around 30 attempts to hand over money, Scrooge always manages to escape. He sets off four more bombs in Karstadt branches in northern Germany and one in Berlin. As if by a miracle, only two people were slightly injured in the detonations:"Scrooge" detonates most of the explosive devices at night, but in two cases his bombs detonate in elevators while customers and employees are in the department stores.
Public sympathizes with "Scrooge"
Nevertheless, the public sympathizes with the resourceful department store blackmailer. The eponymous comic stimulates people's imagination. The sophistication of his technical constructions, with which the blackmailer wants to get the money, are strongly reminiscent of the Disney inventor "Daniel Gyro Gearloose". The media also readily pick up on the comic vocabulary:"Jet engine offender Dagobert" or "Dagobert's gully trick - gluck, gluck, away" are the headlines in the tabloid press.
Comic-like handover attempts and police mishaps
Again and again "Dagobert" surprises the police with extremely creative money transfer plans. For example, he places a sand box on a manhole cover in Berlin. From below he opens the hiding place and once again escapes with a bag. Inside:a few banknotes and a lot of worthless paper. In addition, there are manhunts by law enforcement officials. The blackmailer escapes when he tries to gain access because the pursuing policeman slips just as he is about to grab the fugitive by the collar.
Spectacular:Mini lorry derails with 1.4 million marks
"Scrooge" wants to get the ransom with a self-made mini-lore. But the rail vehicle derailed shortly before the destination.A spectacular handover attempt in January 1994 caused a stir:"Dagobert" wanted to have the money taken to a hiding place with a self-made mini-truck. For this he prepared a disused track in Berlin. Thanks to tripwires and firecrackers, the mini-vehicle is able to successfully outperform the officers on the approximately one-kilometer route. But 30 meters from the finish, the lorry falls off the rails. Particularly annoying for "Dagobert":In this case, the now demanded 1.4 million marks are actually in the pocket.
Arno Funke chooses the pseudonym "Dagobert" at random
In order to protect her from the public, the blackmailer's wife was led into her apartment under a bed sheet.On April 22, 1994, one of the longest and most complex cases of extortion in German criminal history ends. For a good two years, "Dagobert" fooled the police, fascinated the public with his tricks and cost a company a lot of nerves. In a Berlin phone booth, the police finally catch the blackmailer Arno Funke. He's glad it's over. And, contrary to expectations, he is not a Walt Disney fan, rather he chose his pseudonym purely by chance:in July 1992, while looking for a distinctive sentence with which Karstadt should signal its willingness to pay, his gaze was on a bag with the imprint "Scrooge McDuck "figure fallen.
Brain damage and a high IQ
Arno Funke, here on the left, is sentenced to nine years in prison. In August 2000 he was released early.The motive of the unemployed and depressed Berliner Arno Funke is money. He had thought of suicide and wanted to turn his life around with blackmail, Funke said in court. The verdict on January 17, 1995 was seven years and nine months in prison for severe extortion and 2.5 million euros in damages Has. This damage and the resulting depression have a mitigating effect when the case is revised in 1996 - otherwise it would have been more than nine years in prison for the then 46-year-old.
Busy creative
Funke, who was given a high intelligence quotient in an expert report, undergoes successful therapy in prison. At the same time he writes an autobiography and begins to draw caricatures for the satirical magazine "Eulenspiegel". After his dismissal in August 2000, the trained sign and light advertising maker lives in Berlin, works there as a graphic designer and author - and also looks for publicity, for example by appearing on talk and television shows.