New driver against white-collar crime: ZeFin NRW takes off!

New driver against white-collar crime: ZeFin NRW takes off!

On June 17, 2025, a new course in the fight against economic and financial crime will be taken in North Rhine-Westphalia. A central contact point, the central and contact point for the prosecution of economic and financial crime (ZeFin NRW), will be established at the Düsseldorf public prosecutor's office. This new structure marks the end of the 1968 regulation and is intended to ensure greater effectiveness and efficiency in the prosecution of complex, supra-regional and international crimes. [Rechtslupe] reports that one of the key responses to increasingly strategic and organized crime in recent years is the use of nested corporate networks and digital obfuscation techniques.

With the addition of 15 new public prosecutors, ZeFin NRW will work with the existing focal public prosecutor's offices in cities such as Düsseldorf, Bielefeld, Bochum and Cologne. The expertise of these officials is intended to support the criminal law assessment of complex operations in the capital and financial markets and to ensure that regulations are adhered to, especially for banks, financial institutions and crypto providers. The Minister of Justice of North Rhine-Westphalia, Dr. Benjamin Limbach, emphasized the importance of professionalization in this area and promises to consistently sanction violations. [Justice NRW] makes it clear that the goal is clearly defined: ZeFin NRW should be at the forefront of the prosecution of economic and financial crime and support other public prosecutors.

Diverse crimes in focus

Economic and financial crime encompasses a variety of crimes that can significantly disrupt the economic structure and trust in business practices and government institutions. These include, among other things, fraud, tax and insolvency offenses and money laundering. Combined with the increasing number of online crimes, it is clear that the challenge for law enforcement in this area cannot be underestimated. According to [Statista], around 38,900 economic crimes were registered in Germany in 2023, which represents a halving compared to the previous year. Despite this decline, the financial damage caused by such crimes remains at around 2.7 billion euros - a significant amount that underlines the urgency of comprehensive action.

The focus is particularly on fraud, which, with around 18,100 registered cases, is the most common form of white-collar crime. Digitalization has also created new challenges here, such as the increase in computer fraud, which amounted to almost 111,000 cases in 2023. Obviously, the number of unreported crimes in the economic sector remains a serious problem, which makes the work of the new central office even more difficult.

A comprehensive approach is needed

In the future, ZeFin NRW will handle the supra-regional and international dimensions of vital procedures and act as a contact point for cross-procedural questions. Continuous processing of cases by the same clerks and a regulated exchange of knowledge between the different focal areas ensures high-quality prosecution. However, cases that were pending before the new regulation came into force will not automatically be transferred to the new central office, which leaves the existing structures untouched for the time being. Other public prosecutors can still pave the way for voluntary submission to ZeFin NRW if necessary.

The new measures are an important step towards being able to act more decisively and targetedly in the fight against the diverse faces of economic crime, which have not only legal but also social consequences for the general population. Stay tuned to find out more about developments in the fight against economic and financial crime in North Rhine-Westphalia.