Axel Springer settles lawsuit against former Bild editor

German media giant Axel Springer has settled a lawsuit against one of its former top editors, marking a truce in an acrimonious public row that has plagued the Politico owner. 

The publisher, which also owns the business outlet Insider as well as several German newspapers, said that it had “resolved” the case against Julian Reichelt, the former editor of its flagship tabloid Bild who was sacked in 2021 after facing allegations of lying to his employers over sexual relationships with junior female staff.

A statement published by the company said that Reichelt “regrets” having passed information about the company to the owner of a rival media outlet — a reference to an allegation, denied by the journalist, that he shared sensitive internal information about the company despite a written assurance that he no longer held such material.

Axel Springer said that it would withdraw a civil lawsuit that sought to claw back Reichelt’s €2mn in severance pay for breach of contract, and that Reichelt would also drop a counterclaim filed against the company. 

“Axel Springer welcomes the out-of-court settlement as it satisfies the core concerns of the lawsuit and avoids a potentially drawn-out legal dispute,” the statement added.

Axel Springer and a lawyer for Reichelt both declined to give further details on the deal, including whether or not it included any financial compensation. 

But the settlement is likely to come as a relief to executives at the media behemoth — and their shareholders at US private equity firm KKR — after months of negative headlines. These have clouded efforts for a fresh start at Bild, as well as a drive to prioritise a US-focused international expansion and prepare for a public listing of its online jobs platform StepStone.

Reichelt was once one of Axel Springer’s top editors, enjoying a close relationship with chief executive Mathias Döpfner.

He was forced to step aside after facing allegations of sexual misconduct and abuse of power — denied by the former Bild editor — for sleeping with junior staff and interns.

A compliance investigation by the law firm Freshfields found evidence of abuse of power but not sexual harassment. Reichelt was reinstated as editor but was fired seven months later after Axel Springer said that “new findings” had showed he had “failed to maintain a clear boundary between private and professional matters” and had been “untruthful” about this to the company’s executive board.

Axel Springer insiders have long suspected Reichelt of being behind a series of damaging leaks to other media outlets about the company and Döpfner.

Those fears appeared to be confirmed in April this year when executives were approached by Holger Friedrich, the owner of the newspaper Berliner Zeitung, who told them that he had been approached by their former editor with confidential information.

That prompted Axel Springer to take the extraordinary step of taking its former editor to court, filing parallel and civil complaints against him. The initial public hearing, in June, made details of Reichelt’s multimillion severance pay public for the first time.

It is unclear whether public prosecutors will press ahead with a separate criminal investigation into allegations of fraud against Reichelt that were also brought by the company. 

Berlin’s public prosecution office said investigations were continuing and the settlement of the civil case did not “in itself lead to a discontinuation of the preliminary proceedings”.