Court suspends arrest warrant after Lars Windhorst is ready for hearing

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An arrest warrant against Lars Windhorst was temporarily suspended by a German court after he promised to attend a hearing on the insolvency of a dilapidated shopping center.

The conditional lifting of the arrest warrant came hours after it was confirmed that one had been issued against the controversial German financier. He failed to appear for a court hearing in April, according to a spokeswoman for the Hanover District Court, which is overseeing the insolvency proceedings.

The investor has also ignored multiple requests to hand over documents and keys related to the Ihme Center, a shopping center and residential complex from the 1970s in downtown Hanover, which is now undergoing insolvency proceedings, the spokeswoman added.

“Mr Windhorst has not fulfilled his legal obligation to cooperate in the insolvency proceedings,” the Hanover District Court told the Financial Times. The investor also did not appear at a hearing on April 22 and did not apologize.

A court spokeswoman confirmed later Tuesday that the arrest warrant had just been lifted after Windhorst promised to cooperate and agreed to attend a court hearing scheduled for later this month. The lifting of the arrest warrant is contingent on Windhorst fulfilling those obligations.

The arrest warrant added to Windhorst’s legal woes, which a Dutch court in April threatened with a prison sentence in another business dispute. Although the financier is not wanted by German police, Windhorst faces up to three weeks in prison if he does not cooperate in the civil proceedings, according to the Hanover court. The bailiff hearing the case is legally obliged to arrest him and could ask the police for assistance.

A spokesman for Windhorst’s Tennor Group told the FT on Tuesday that Windhorst would answer the court’s questions. He stressed that the investor was “not on the run” and that “detention was out of the question”. He added that Windhorst had appealed against the arrest warrant.

The spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the temporary suspension of the arrest warrant.

The subject of the insolvency proceedings is a shopping center in which Windhorst acquired the majority shares in 2019 and promised to invest millions in the renovation. After the expensive renovation failed to materialize, two important office tenants – the city of Hanover and the energy company Enercity – terminated their contracts early last year and stopped paying rent. At the end of 2023, Hanover lawyer Jens Wilhelm V. was appointed insolvency administrator by the Hanover District Court.

Windhorst was pressured for months to hand over detailed information about the ownership structure, payment flows and other documents, said a person with direct knowledge of the arrest warrant, which was issued after all other means of getting Windhorst to cooperate failed, the person added.

Windhorst’s latest legal hurdle comes months after the Berlin public prosecutor’s office closed a long-running investigation into possible violations of the German Banking Act. The trigger was a criminal complaint filed by the financial regulator BaFin.

The regulator suspects that Windhorst may have conducted banking activities without a license, an offence that carries a maximum sentence of five years. Berlin prosecutors told the FT that the case was dropped in April due to a lack of evidence.

Last year, a judge at London’s High Court also found Windhorst in contempt of court for failing to appear at an enforcement hearing in proceedings brought by an investment firm linked to a Monaco billionaire.