One of Germany’s richest families to donate €9.7 million over Nazi past
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The Reimann family, with big stakes in Krispy Kreme and Pret a Manger and one of Germany’s richest families, will be donating €9.7 million to charity after learning the extent of their family’s ties to the Nazi regime.
The decision was taken after the unearthing of evidence showing the Reimann family’s ancestors support of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime, according to a report by German tabloid Bild am Sonntag.
The Reimann family’ owe JAB Holding Company with a controlling interest in several major brands. Peter Harf, the family’s spokesman and a managing partner of JAB Holding Company, whilst confirming the Bild am Sonntag report, added that he and the family were speechless, ashamed and there is nothing to gloss over. “These crimes are disgusting.”
The report focused on Albert Reimann Senior and Albert Reimann Junior – father and son who died in 1954 and 1984 respectively – and their industrial chemicals company in the city of Ludwigshafen during the Nazi era. The report found that they used Russian civilians and French prisoners of war as forced labourers in their factories and private residences and were also avowed supporters of Adolf Hitler.
The family’s links to the Nazi regime were revealed in a 1978 report but the younger generation, after reading documents from the Nazi era kept by the family, decided to commission historians from the University of Munich in 2014 to investigate.
The experts presented their findings to the family several weeks ago and were revealed by the German tabloid on Sunday.
