Maike Kohl-Richter
Kohl widow should not receive any compensation
Maike Kohl-Richter and Helmut Kohl in 2012.
© imago images / photothek
The Federal Court of Justice has ruled that Maike Kohl-Richter is not entitled to compensation in the millions.
Maike Kohl-Richter (57), the widow of the late former Federal Chancellor Helmut Kohl (1930-2017), will not receive any compensation in the millions. After years of litigation, the Federal Court of Justice has now ruled that Kohl’s widow is not entitled to it.
The decision states that a claim for monetary compensation due to a violation of the general right of personality is “in principle not hereditary”. The Federal Court of Justice thus declares that a corresponding prior assumption by the Higher Regional Court is correct.
That was what happened
The journalist Heribert Schwan (76) had spoken to Kohl for hundreds of hours and wrote his memoir. After a falling out, Schwan published the book “Legacy: The Kohl Protocols”, which contained unauthorized quotations. Thereupon a legal dispute broke out between Schwan, his co-author, the publisher and Kohl.
The former Chancellor was awarded compensation by the Cologne Regional Court in 2017 for violating his personal rights. It was a record sum of one million euros. However, Kohl died shortly afterwards and Maike Kohl-Richter continued the legal dispute as sole heir.