Had his own jess as an airfield and several of luxury homes. Politicians gathered around him. Banks lend him huge amounts of money nothing was too good for him. We wanted to find out how he managed to scam billions in a complex pyramid scheme. To date month me their lives and my yoga where he retired after he got out of prison. Smita wants to keep his family out of this recalls his exwife and 2 children live in switzerland all meet up. Puzzler when his father was a businessman he discovered at an early age that he had a talent for making money. We missed him at one of his favorite restaurants near palma. Through the. Course i was always ambitious i wanted to have a job i was for cold when i was in college i sold cars and the 1st 3 w. s and then mercedes you have me say 3 more that when i was 16 i sold Life Insurance after school for in the 4th year i worked for a company that was owned by the father of one of my friends who live by always wanted to have something to do but at some point when i took a wrong turn you can and i either didnt notice at the time or i realized it too late good night. To be america. Prosecutors say that she needed company flow text cheated banks and Leasing Companies out of more than 4000000000 monks. I know tough man was one of the prosecutors encinitas case documents used as evidence at his trial stored in this basement room at the Prosecutors Office in mn hi im. Hoffman carried out extensive interviews with smita we asked him what drove shmita to commit these crimes. 1st he didnt have a lot of friends at school. But at the age of 16 in the mid 1960 s. He got a moped. And submitted and none of the other kids had one more peter sagal and he used that moped to make friends with more hot. He wanted to be popular thought on norman and i think that was a basic component of his character and respond play constantly sought the approval of others 50 einsteinian. Manfred sneed out sounded slow tex in 1994 and became enormously successful over the next several years. Also forced on france and germany could be pretty intimidating he was always very well dressed with a tailor made suits and a rolex on his wrist. A very impressive and examples of their time in other muslim he takes everything he does to extremes. When he goes after Something Else for he chases it like a terrier until he gets a tell. The boy who started out with a moped had made it to the top and now owned a fleet of luxury cars. In 1009900 his 50th birthday with a gun a event at this is stated to him back on the outskirts of cars who live. Downtown and im now doing great invited about 300 people politicians Business Executives sports stars anybody who is anybody by the lord is into it then im a lot of people were dying to get an invitation. Thats it was the event of the year in the state of barton when barack and it went about building work. Shmita lived a life of luxury a private jet with gold faucets. Villas all over the world anything florida youre a guy and some of. Even 3 yachts the largest was 55 meters long. From the sultan of brunei. Now its not really his extravagance was excessive. On the one hand that sort of lifestyle makes some people envious not the least of their i know on the other hand envy is the highest form of recognition night the former us media used his position to win approval from people. Because im not sure how to. He had all the toys that anyone could want a huge collection of beautiful cars yachts jet aircraft. And even had his own airport who else has that. We took me that she visit the airfield that he used to and its now the culls who bought him bought an international airport. For this report shmita agree to visit some of the places that played an Important Role in his life as he made his way to the tunnel. He used to come here often at one time he had 2 private planes and a helicopter parked here. He built his Business Empire on a Technology Concept that he discovered in the late 1980 s. A u. S. Company called flow mile developed a horizontal drilling system so that utility lines could be laid without causing a lot of environmental damage. Adapt to this idea and convinced banks and Leasing Companies to invest in it. No one done before in this instance we were convinced that this was a great system and the banks thought so as well and frankly they gave us 20000000 to develop the equipment we neednt young on the sum up on the market market sridhar promoted his concept with expensive advents that were broadcast on prime time german t. V. Starts making a gas line and images and those were doing it underground yet underground without digging out you know if its a new system. But the commercials were deceptive in fact the drilling machines didnt. Rocks and existing mines got in the way. So she does business never really got off the ground but he managed to convince investors that his company was turning a profit. We actually started out piecemeal. Its not like my partner and i actually planned to rip people off. And we believed in this concept. We wanted it to be a success so we manufactured statistics that appeared to make it a success we were counting on future sales and thats how we came up with this system and the thesis is themed and i often stand the banks were delighted to help finance this project. Because. At the height of the scandal media had convinced invest is that his company had more than 3000 drilling machines but in reality they were just under 300. To keep that in keeping the scheme going wish me to stay as a salesman. And he can be very charming. If youve known him a long time like i have thats those who are less impressed by him. But most people were taken in by his charm and to put it bluntly. As my guns. Hasnt flown over his former Company Headquarters in the early 2 decades. Today were taking the same routes that he did back then. We were right over it. It would have been a short trip by car but smita preferred to take the chopper. Book its faster and no traffic jams either. I think though. He often took investors along the helicopter was on call 24 hours a day right over it. Still but were going to learn. More right there where those containers are. Worked in a look seriously appointed office hes come a long way from selling used cars for a living. This is where he built a Business Empire that turned out to be little more than a house of cards. And it came crashing down on february 4th 2000. Police arrested months which meta at his office. For most of his employees this development came as a complete surprise. It was on a friday afternoon when most of the world has were getting ready to go home. Soil farming criminal reporting so it was the police and some tax investigators i could hardly believe it im against on the version i was shocked on its its wendys and then i thought thats that they wouldnt be here if they didnt have a good reason to. Police and officials from the Prosecutors Office carried out boxes full of evidence this was shaping up to be the biggest case of financial fraud in postwar german history. 2 decades later this is all that remains of the flow tech sign on top of this building. The company that had been the darling of bankers and politicians went out of business in late 1999. This is the 1st time that shmita has been back here since flow techs collapsed. The frantic call because its a very strange feeling to be here after 18 years and 2 weeks to go here to come. On have this one called for i could still see the place in my mind but now that im actually here its difficult for me to look back at everything that happened with a list them out of a group or feel the rest. Of the story with that was the hardest day of my life and. He hasnt been back here since the day he was arrested. For the so this was mrs lobs office my secretary. Its almost hard to believe that this is the place wish me to i made all of his deals. This is really difficult. Most of us are desk. Over here right there. Alert i feel like im in a movie right now. Before this im glad that i came back here though so that i can somehow it close this chapter of my life. But its not easy we thought. Id like to leave now. The flow tax system worked for 5 years smita kept selling machines even though most of them existed only on paper. He created an elaborate business for a song to fool his investors. We took a creative approach when the Bank Auditors wanted to see some drilling machines and wed switch the identification plates. And show them as much equipment as they wanted the balls with the machine in the holocaust and if you got same point and. They kept some of the machines in this warehouse officials from the banks and Leasing Companies had a look around and was satisfied. Zinga common how much they came in and broke down the id numbers of and check them against the list they had at the office media and they all matched up. And so they also look at the id plates with see and they checked out as well. And im to duplicate man good fortune at the end of the day he was probably pleased to see how easy it was to deceive people the mood of life to have. It all seemed so easy almost a sure thing smita kept playing his shell game with the drilling equipment and the banks kept lending him money after all he had to make the Monthly Payments even if the machines existed only on paper. Throwing glasses is the end of it was a classic pyramid scheme and it worked at 1st because he used the new loans to pay off old creditors and glory bigger but then things got out of hand and it became more and more difficult to control it severe to hotton on its violent ended and he got to the point where he had to come up with 60000000 marks a month just to make the leasing payments you. Know more not least begins again. Thats me to manage to convince the banks to keep giving him money to burn. The banks made big profits with these flow text deals and guns and all my warm year to many good food he and the camp im a bang for yall again big branches were competing with each other to get his business. To storm all the scheme would never have worked in the banks had played along absolutely not guns that the theres no way. That this under oath was. Deliberately kept his meetings with Bank Executives short he preferred to spend his time flying them around in his helicopter and treating them to sumptuous meals. On his ive been through cough and fly out to the airfield near serling and then celebrate with a big lunch. Because she had a cold the liquid lunches for me isnt nice that everyone drank a lot of alcohol. So maybe he was trying to get his guests to be a little less cautious. Sometimes theyd fly to the nearby alsace region to sample the excellent local wines or hed invite bankers and Business Partners to his yacht or one of his business. I created situations where i can demonstrate my success to the outside world that was very important for me a few months but i didnt write people out to the yard through them take them to dinner what the thought and these displays of success became part of the Business Model and weeks i had to do it the get the scheme going. This done to me think more cup would get into. A 996 smita himself an airfield a former Canadian Military facility near baton baton. The powerful state politician helped him to arrange the deal the honorary chairman of the bond didnt act Free Democratic policy. Recommended with the German Government should sell the airfield and at a reasonable price to about 38000000. 00 marks. He also arranged for us to get a government subsidy provided that we got final approval and started light operations. On that was a great deal for us so we went ahead with it. Deliberately made a point of according to all the titians who could help him grow his Business People who could open doors for him. Toads or and m. Will oh boy included youre going more like a respected politician who knew everyone on the counter. Moves. Through more like whos he met a lot of important people and so it was a smart move for him to make some dominating type. Of talk. Show mido also started building a new flow text headquarters complex at the airfield leading politicians attended the groundbreaking ceremony including the state premier at the time having to fly for. All. The guests were impressed with his model of the proposed new facility. Smita made a promotional video. For hero from here will tackle the projects of the 3rd monium. Meter claim that this new facility would bring prosperity to the region. State premier teufel took the controls of an excavator at a ceremony to mark the start of construction. But for this report none of the politicians who worked with smita wanted to talk to us about him. After all its a very old story. So obviously shmeat amid the media enjoyed being around politicians and they enjoyed being around him who it was it was like they acknowledged each others importance can. Be shown the. Leader bill is a former barn veteran back interior minister who later chaired a state Parliament Committee that investigated the flow text scandal. At this point questions were already being raised about the companys finances but prosecutors and the tax authorities didnt. Investigators perhaps because of all the powerful politicians who were linked to shmita. He knew a lot of people in the State Government including the premier mr bush were so he must be an important guy if he wasnt he says met him at nothing to do with him and. That influence the decisions made by the author or it is its not like they said im not going anywhere near that case but they did see that they had to be careful because of shmita status of our small pool Means Committee for 50 so. In july 999 mido through a huge party to celebrate his 50th birthday heres a picture of the official invitation and the guest list. 300. 00 people were invited it was an event that no one wanted to miss. Among the guests was former bottom there some back state premiers. Who gave the opening speech and. The festivities took place at smead us too on that estate. He and his family lived there until his wrist in february 2000 and. Microsoft my biggest mistake was that i used my Financial Resources to create an image of success for me to provide not only for the outside world but also for me personally i wanted people to envy me. And when people are jealous of you and you crash and burn they all cheer for him to help. Me on the way to man fits me to his former estates at 2 and back near because. The prophecy covers 60000 square meters. Back then he believed that he deserved to live in a place like this but. When i look back at those times i cant believe that i didnt realize how serious things have become. The whole thing kept getting bigger and bigger and i just went along with it. Smita says that he was cool up in the spiral of events that he could not escape. With. You only have one goal and youll do whatever it takes to achieve it you lose your sense of right and wrong and you do some things that are wrong and are called not merely questionable. If you do things that are illegal but you dont care anymore if you look this far from. Behind these walls month me to entertain his guests and impress them with his wealth but many of his friends from back then are long gone. They came to my parties and had a lot of fun for me but when the whole thing collapsed and they disappeared on the. M goals time when he lost everything including the yachts those people didnt want to have anything to do with him. We wouldnt call them friends that would have one of those one so long argument. Hot when youre region powerful people like to be around you. But if you get into trouble no one wants to know you. Its a tool. To drop down a little that would be great. Its hard to believe that man fetch me to manage to get away with this scheme for so long but the bigger it costs the more people believed him. Not to really define what it was all based on power and influence and money and. It was like he was too big to fail maybe some people thought he was but no one seemed to doubt that the company was profitable than the thing to stick and if most money of all was money he said to himself as i have to show my family in the state about in britain back that i can be successful as can. And thats just what he tried to do in order so that in the town. For a time month french media was able to convince people that he was a model entrepreneur. He attracted politicians who thought that he could be useful to them and bankers who thought that hed make them a lot of money. Today he regrets what he did. The you shed the pounds into a fig bank and given his the primary victims were the banks not any private Individuals Bank and just the bank of his help and he wont lift the skivvies i do have a guilty conscience and to this day for us what we did was wrong in seahawk the floor im low quite high and then crashed and its all my fault good to align my dish i cant blame anyone else will give me. But most of all of the course and im sorry about how this affected my family because id made them feel miserable to stop it or to stop. Me. They were mutated into a nameless mass. Their bodies mere tools the history of the slave trade is governor. Describes how the greed for power and profit plummeted an entire continent into a moment this time europes expansion for the world in our series of mostly. Each step tells my story. Of the people who plan to me build dedicated to me. I am not too dumb to. Be honest with my name. In the centuries they built me they created something truly. The too much as i must destroy it. I have monta my cities days for centuries and a company of my country transferring cars until the day i mean ive done. Nothing done differently. Johnson a fool a. Has a virus spread. Why do we panic and when will all this tremendous through the tax and weekly radio program. The show is called spectrum if you would like more information on the coronavirus or any other science topics you should really check out our podcast so you can get it wherever you get your podcast you can also find us at dot com. Science. Indeed. Climate change. Proposed to make their suv. Into a. Much too soon people claim what endears do they have their future. Cut. G. W. Dot com for can they go surfing the multimedia. Could turn. The to play. Play play. Play. This is d. F. W. News l