Wirecard fugitive Jan Marsalek: from financial fraudster to Russian spymaster?

By Michael Holden and Sam Tobin

LONDON (Reuters) - Jan Marsalek, the Wirecard executive who went on the run five years ago after the dramatic implosion of the German payments company, was a Russian spy directing espionage operations across Europe, according to British authorities.

When Wirecard collapsed in 2020 owing creditors almost $4 billion, Marsalek was named as a key suspect in Germany's biggest post-war fraud and an international manhunt was launched for the company's Austrian chief operating officer.

But rather than lying low, a trial in London which concluded on Friday has heard how British prosecutors and police say in the years since, Marsalek has directed teams of spies to do the bidding of his Moscow handlers.

"He's a significant person of interest in this environment," Commander Dominic Murphy, head of the Metropolitan Police's Counter Terrorism Command, told reporters. "There are ongoing investigations across the board, both here and overseas."

At the time of Wirecard's collapse in July 2020, Marsalek, 44, was reportedly in Russia or Belarus. His current whereabouts are unknown and he remains the subject of an Interpol red notice relating to fraud.

When British police arrested Bulgarian national Orlin Roussev in eastern England in 2023, they recovered tens of thousands of messages sent between him and Marsalek.

Roussev pleaded guilty to spying for Russia last year, shortly before the start of the trial of other Bulgarians in an alleged Russian espionage unit.

The conversations between Marsalek and Roussev were key to "identifying how this group acted and were tasked," police commander Murphy said, and included references to Russia's GRU military intelligence and jokes about the nerve agent Novichok, used to target Russian double agent Sergei Skripal in Salisbury, England, in 2018.

Police also found surveillance equipment and several false identity documents – including fake Belgian, Bulgarian and French passports bearing Marsalek's photo.

Beyond this case, however, British police and officials have been tight-lipped about what exactly Marsalek and his Russian connections were doing as investigations across Europe continue.

"We know he acted as a conduit between this group and Russian intelligence services," Murphy said. He said Marsalek was not wanted by British police "at this time", but added: "That's not to say he won't be."

Marsalek's German lawyer Frank Eckstein did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

RECRUITED IN 2014?

Marsalek joined Wirecard in 2000, the year after it was founded, and by 2010 was COO of a fintech darling that expanded at a rapid pace – although its meteoric rise came under scrutiny from investors and journalists.

An investigation by Der Spiegel, Der Standard, The Insider and ZDF published last year said Marsalek first met his handler from the GRU military intelligence service in 2014.

One message between Roussev and Marsalek suggested Marsalek used his position at Wirecard to gather information on Bellingcat, an investigative collective whose chief Russia investigator, Christo Grozev, was targeted by the Bulgarian spying unit.

When Roussev sent a photo of Grozev with Bellingcat founder Eliot Higgins at a conference, Marsalek said: "I'm very familiar with them: Wirecard was processing a large part of their payments and we had access to the flight booking data as well."

His messages shown to the court also suggest he was involved with other Russian units: when discussing surveillance of journalist Roman Dobrokhotov, founder of The Insider, in Montenegro, he told Roussev to get his team to back off.

"We don't want our team to run into another team by accident," Marsalek warned.

Marsalek also reportedly had links to Austrian intelligence, with a former agent arrested last year on suspicion of passing information to Marsalek, according to German and Austrian media.

One British official described Marsalek as a man with his fingers in many "pies" with only a small number relating to UK security.

FALLOUT FROM SALISBURY

The 2018 poisoning of Skripal and his daughter triggered the biggest diplomatic expulsions since the Cold War. British police and prosecutors said the mass expulsion of suspected Russian intelligence officers across Europe that followed prompted Moscow to contract out its spying operations.

Last October, the head of UK's domestic spy agency MI5 said the GRU was seeking to cause "mayhem" across Britain and Europe and was turning to criminals, drug traffickers and proxies to carry out its "dirty work".

The Metropolitan Police's Murphy said Marsalek and Roussev's operations were "one of those clear examples of outsourcing".

Russia has repeatedly rejected British accusations that it was involved in spying activities, accusing London of enflaming anti-Russian hysteria.

The messages showed that Marsalek and Roussev joked about the possible need for cover stories like seeing "cathedrals in Salisbury", an apparent reference to the reason given by the suspects named by Britain as responsible for the Skripal attack.

"A successful operation on British ground would be amazing after the fu*** up Skripal stuff," Marsalek told Roussev in August 2022, in a message presented at the trial.

(Reporting by Michael Holden and Sam Tobin; Editing by Ros Russell)