Interference with freedom of the press: Block process: seizures at “Zeit” partly illegal

dpa | The trial surrounding the kidnapping of the Block children recently caused further headlines due to the seizure of interview recordings from the time - now the court has partially revised its decision. The Hamburg regional court overturned parts of its own search warrant and declared the confiscation of several recordings unlawful.

It argued that only audio recordings of the allegedly injured younger daughter were relevant to the trial. “Against this background, the chamber declared the provisional seizure of the audio recordings relating to the older daughter to be unlawful,” says the press release. The chamber was responding to a complaint from Zeit-Verlag.

The background to the complaint procedure is conversations that a Zeit-Verlag employee had with the children at the beginning of 2024 - two weeks after the kidnapping. The journalist then published the recordings in the podcast entitled “Time Crime: ‘House of Block’”.

On October 12, the Hamburg regional court demanded the release of the records and threatened a search. The chamber justified the decision with the potential evidentiary significance of the audio recordings in the trial. The recorded conversations could be about circumstances that have not yet been discussed in the main hearing. It's about solving a crime.

The journalist and publisher complied with the request, but filed a complaint. Zeit editor-in-chief Giovanni di Lorenzo contradicted the regional court's statement that the journalist had handed over the audio recordings voluntarily. “We were put under a lot of pressure: with the handover we were able to avert a search and at least avoid a lot more documents and material being confiscated,” said di Lorenzo. Other bodies also criticized the interference with press freedom.

The court has now accepted the complaint, at least in part. While the chamber had initially justified the search warrant by seizing possible contractual documents between the journalist or Die Zeit and the Block family, this is now no longer valid. “The chamber is not sticking to this any further,” it says. It is credible that there was neither a contract nor any money flowed.

However, the chamber is not moving away from seizing the audio recordings of the journalist with her younger daughter shortly after the end of the alleged kidnapping. “A particularly close questioning of child victim witnesses by and in the presence of other authority figures could lead to significant external suggestive influences on the witness statements,” the court statement continues. Without precise knowledge of the content of the conversation, the statements made later to the police would be difficult to verify.

The chamber justified its actions because the measures were proportionate because the proceedings involved serious allegations and the taking of evidence was about to be completed. At the same time, the regional court referred the complaint to the higher regional court. The recordings would not be evaluated until the decision was made.

The trial itself concerns the accusation of child abduction. Hamburg entrepreneur Christina Block (53) is accused of commissioning an Israeli security company to kidnap her two youngest children to Germany after a bitter custody dispute. The daughter was 13 years old at the time and the son was 10. The entrepreneur denies the allegations.