Berlin (dpa) – The Adlon family has been fighting for years to obtain compensation for the expropriation of the famous luxury hotel at the Brandenburg Gate. Now there has been another defeat for the descendants of the hotel builder Lorenz Adlon. The administrative court in Berlin closed a lawsuit by the heirs on Thursday, with which they wanted to resume the previous restitution proceedings. Felix Adlon, representing the community of heirs, has announced further legal steps – if necessary up to the Federal Constitutional Court. “Our journey doesn’t end here,” he said after the announcement of the verdict. (Ref.: VG 29 K 131/20)
The great-grandson of the hotel builder cares above all about the reputation of the Adlon family, as Felix Adlon emphasized before the hearing: “My great-grandparents Hedda and Louis Adlon were not Nazis. I want the dignity of my ancestors back production.” He himself knows that it is no longer possible to transfer the famous luxury hotel back: “The train has left”. However, the plaintiffs were hoping for “some material justice,” explained his lawyer Wolfgang Peters. According to Felix Adlon, they were dispossessed as heirs and robbed of their inheritance.
In his view, after years of research, there is new evidence that the Adlons themselves were victims of National Socialist persecution and had already been “actually expropriated” by the Nazis. The court did not see enough evidence for this. The presiding judge, Ulrich Kessler, said in the verdict that the world-famous hotel had been “exploited” by the Nazis. However, hotel operators were not completely barred from their properties before 1945.
The Adlon now belongs to the Kempinski group of luxury hotels. The old luxury hotel, which opened in 1907, was originally famous. At the end of the Second World War, the hotel burned down in 1945 except for a side wing. In 1984 this remainder was also demolished. The name Adlon has remained a myth. On August 23, 1997, the Adlon Hotel was finally reopened.
The dispute over the luxury home dates back to the 1990s: immediately after German-German reunification, the Adlon family asked for the property to be reallocated. In 1994 the property was sold. In 1997, the State Office of Settlement of Unresolved Real Estate Issues rejected an initial relocation application.
The heirs could not bear it and requested a reopening in 2019 with reference to new evidence, without success. Therefore, the Administrative Court had to deal with the case. However, from the 29th Chamber’s point of view, some of the information was either already known or presented too late.
Regardless, the court also held that the evidence would not lead to a different decision. In 1949, the victorious Soviet power listed war criminals and National Socialists (“List 3”) and expropriated them. Hedda and Louis Adlon were among them as they had joined the NSDAP in 1941.
Felix Adlon said he joined the NSDAP to protect the world famous hotel. “It has been nine years since Hitler took power,” he stressed. However, the administrative judges referred to the jurisprudence of the highest court: the Federal Constitutional Court has repeatedly confirmed that this exclusion of retransfer does not violate the Basic Law.
“The Adlon is a special case,” said attorney Peters. The jurisprudence that Nazi property confiscated from the former Soviet Union generally cannot be returned needs to be reconsidered.
The judgment is not final. The next competent body is the Federal Administrative Court. In order for the Leipzig judges to deal with the case, however, the Adlons have to overcome further legal hurdles.
“I know I didn’t exactly make her happy,” Judge Kessler said after the verdict was announced. However, a remark made by the judge at the hearing got Felix Adlon pardoned: from what is known so far about the hotel couple Heddi and Louis Adlon, it can be said: “They weren’t so bad at hands”.
© dpa-infocom, dpa:221207-99-819093/6
