A SECURITY guard accused of trying to blackmail F1 legend Michael Schumacher’s family allegedly stole two hard drives of medical data.
The man – who can only be named as Markus F due to German law, had worked for the family as a security guard for approximately five years.
According to reports obtained by Germany’s BILD, the former security guard allegedly stole around 1,500 files.
According to the report, there were up to 500 images on one hard drive and as many as 1,000 files on the second hard drive.
These included photos, videos, medication lists and the contents of Schumacher’s patient file.
It comes after it was reported that Markus F was allegedly trying to get £12million for the stolen medical data to help pay off his debts.
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The 52-year-old was arrested on Thursday as the main perpetrator behind the suspected attempt to extort the Schumacher family.
It’s alleged that the accused man was a vice consul in Egypt who wanted to free himself of his debts by allegedly committing the heinous crime.
In early 2009, he became assistant to the German honorary consul in Hurghada, Egypt.
A few years later he returned to Germany and resumed his career in security.
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This is where he allegedly got to know other bouncers, including the co-accused Yilmaz T, 53, who Markus F allegedly commissioned to carry out the alleged £12 million extortion.
According to BILD information, Markus F. only promised to give Yilmaz T a commission in the low single-digit million range.
Yilmaz T’s was caught and arrested with his son Daniel L, 30 in connection to the alleged crime.
Daniel L is the first of the accused to be released on conditional bail. His older brother Julian posted his £8,431 bail. Daniel L also had to hand over his passport and must report to the police.
Senior public prosecutor Wolf-Tilman Baumert, spokesman for the Wuppertal public prosecutor’s office, said: “After the advanced investigations, we currently assume that the accused son may have acted more as an accomplice.”
Family employees close to wife Corinna Schumacher were said to have been approached by the trio who claimed to have found a file of secrets on the F1 driver.
Schumacher – a seven-time F1 world champion- has not been seen for more than 10 years after a horrific ski crash left him in a medically induced coma.
According to the Wuppertal office, the men said the family wouldn’t want the files to become public due to what they contained.
To keep the information private the trio reportedly demanded they were sent millions to keep the information off the dark web.
The suspects were even alleged to have sent some of the files to the family as proof, said prosecutors in June.
Cops were able to track down the extortionists through “technical measures”, it was announced last month.
The Schumacher family have been tormented over Michael’s health in the past.
In 2016, a 25-year-old man known as Hüseyin B sent a threatening email to Corinna targeting the couple’s children.
The mum-of-two quickly passed on the email to the police who swiftly tracked down the painter.
After being arrested, the thug was sent to court where a judge sentenced him for a year and nine months behind bars.
The perpetrator was reportedly caught after he told Corinna to send him the money to his personal bank account – something the police easily traced back.
In May, the Schumacher family were awarded £170,000 in compensation after a magazine published a fake AI-generated interview with the racing legend.
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German publication Die Aktuelle claimed to have secured a “world exclusive” with the severely injured Ferrari great last April despite Michael not being seen publicly since his 2013 skiing accident.
In a two-page spread, promoted with a picture of Schumacher, it claimed the seven-time F1 champ had said “My life has totally changed”.
MICHAEL Schumacher’s life was hanging by a thread 10-years-ago as medics tried desperately to keep him alive after a tragic skiing crash that left him with horrific brain injuries.
The F1 legend was given the best possible treatment as he was put into a medically induced coma, had his body temperature lowered and underwent hours of tricky operations on his brain.
Back in 2013, the retired seven-time world champion, and his then 14-year-old son set off on the Combe de Saulire ski run in the exclusive French resort of Meribel.
Footage from his helmet camera revealed he was not travelling at excessive speed when his skis struck a rock hidden beneath the snow.
He catapulted forward 11.5ft and crashed into a boulder head first that split his helmet into two and left him needing to be airlifted to hospital for two life-saving operations.
At one point his family were told to brace themselves for the worst case scenario as the situation was much worse than originally believed.
At the time, medics said Schumacher was likely to stay in an induced coma for at least 48 hours as his body and mind recovered.
But the coma ended up lasting 250 days – more than eight months.
After he woke up in June 2014, he was discharged from hospital and sent to his home in Lake Geneva to get further treatment.
Since then his wife Corinna and his inner circle of friends have expertly avoided almost anything leaking out about his health status.
Only small amounts of information have been released including reports that Schumacher was in a wheelchair but can react to things around him.
In 2019, it was said that Schumacher was set to undergo breakthrough stem cell therapy in a bid to regenerate and rebuild his nervous system.
Renowned France cardiologist Dr Philippe Menasche, who had operated on him previously, was set to carry out the treatment that would see cells from his heart go to his brain.
Following the treatment at the Georges Pompidou Hospital in Paris, he was said to be “conscious”, although few other details were given about his state.
Source: Motorsport - thesun.co.uk
