Uwe Gemballa Reported Missing
Mar 5, 2010 | 02:09 PM
#178
Supposedly the family "took back" their reward offer this morning ... lots of way to interpret that, for sure, but none of them are positive.
Mar 5, 2010 | 10:08 PM
#179
Teamspeed Member
Joined: Dec 2008
Posts: 114
New articles in the South African press now report that SA police (Criminal Investigation Division) believe Gemballa was "likely the victim of a violent crime".
Unfortunately, we are one step closer to a very sad day in the automotive world.
"But for the police is increasingly likely that Gemballa was the victim of a violent crime. "The overall circumstances of the telephone call on February 9, let us come to the assessment that there is probably a crime in the area," said CID chief Ruediger Winter. The conversation behavior of 54-year-olds, the strange story of an accident and the high amount of cash, which should send the woman to South Africa - these and other factors not mentioned clearly speak for it."
A very sad day for me. But I will continue to burn the candle.
Unfortunately, we are one step closer to a very sad day in the automotive world.
"But for the police is increasingly likely that Gemballa was the victim of a violent crime. "The overall circumstances of the telephone call on February 9, let us come to the assessment that there is probably a crime in the area," said CID chief Ruediger Winter. The conversation behavior of 54-year-olds, the strange story of an accident and the high amount of cash, which should send the woman to South Africa - these and other factors not mentioned clearly speak for it."
A very sad day for me. But I will continue to burn the candle.
Last edited by Forgedwheeler; Mar 6, 2010 at 09:37 AM.
Mar 9, 2010 | 08:49 AM
#180
Teamspeed Senior Member
Joined: Dec 2009
Posts: 535
Missing German may have staged own 'kidnapping' - Times LIVE
"Detectives of the police's organised crime unit are investigating the possibility that a German businessman who was feared kidnapped soon after arriving in Johannesburg last month may have staged his own disappearance. Police initially believed that Uwe Gemballa, whose Porsche conversion company has outlets worldwide, may have been kidnapped after he called his wife soon after arriving in Johannesburg from Dubai on February 8 and asked her to wire him a million euros.
But now police believe that Gemballa - whose company in Germany was placed in provisional liquidation soon after he disappeared - has gone into hiding in a bid to avoid creditors.
The possibility that Gemballa may be lying low in Angola, where a successful franchise of his company operates, is also being investigated.
Police spokesman Senior Superintendent Vishnu Naidoo said: "We have no information that Gemballa was kidnapped and we are treating the investigation as that of a missing person."
Gemballa was due to meet a fugitive Czech Republic billionaire, according to sources with knowledge of the investigation.
The billionaire, Radovan Krejcír, confirmed on Friday that he had been prepared to put the money up for a Gemballa Porsche conversion franchise to be set up in South Africa. But he denied he had ever met Gemballa and said he had no idea where the German was.
Krejcír has already been sentenced in absentia to six-and-a-half years for tax fraud in the Czech Republic. In 2005, the High Court in Johannesburg turned down an application for his extradition. The German authorities have sent detectives to South Africa to assist local authorities"
"Detectives of the police's organised crime unit are investigating the possibility that a German businessman who was feared kidnapped soon after arriving in Johannesburg last month may have staged his own disappearance. Police initially believed that Uwe Gemballa, whose Porsche conversion company has outlets worldwide, may have been kidnapped after he called his wife soon after arriving in Johannesburg from Dubai on February 8 and asked her to wire him a million euros.
But now police believe that Gemballa - whose company in Germany was placed in provisional liquidation soon after he disappeared - has gone into hiding in a bid to avoid creditors.
The possibility that Gemballa may be lying low in Angola, where a successful franchise of his company operates, is also being investigated.
Police spokesman Senior Superintendent Vishnu Naidoo said: "We have no information that Gemballa was kidnapped and we are treating the investigation as that of a missing person."
Gemballa was due to meet a fugitive Czech Republic billionaire, according to sources with knowledge of the investigation.
The billionaire, Radovan Krejcír, confirmed on Friday that he had been prepared to put the money up for a Gemballa Porsche conversion franchise to be set up in South Africa. But he denied he had ever met Gemballa and said he had no idea where the German was.
Krejcír has already been sentenced in absentia to six-and-a-half years for tax fraud in the Czech Republic. In 2005, the High Court in Johannesburg turned down an application for his extradition. The German authorities have sent detectives to South Africa to assist local authorities"