German waste dumped in Czechia: company director gets 4.5 years

The district court in Weiden, Germany, has sentenced Michael R., director of the company Roth International, to four and a half years in prison for shipping waste to Czechia instead of recycling it. His Czech accomplice received a two-year suspended sentence. Presiding judge Markus Fillinger read out the verdict on Thursday; it is not yet final.

How the scheme worked

“You deceived the authorities, forged documents and cared neither about the health of your employees nor about the law. All that mattered to you was money and maximum profit,” the judge said, looking the businessman in the eye. According to him, Michael R. knew that his waste-processing plant in Wernberg-Köblitz did not work, yet he kept taking orders and simply sent the material to Czechia.

The waste ended up in a former sawmill in Jiříkov-Těchlov, in the municipality of Morkovice and on the outskirts of Brno. When one site filled up, the shipments were moved to another. The company brought up to 700 tonnes of waste into Czechia: plastic, fiberglass aircraft parts, wind turbine components, automotive parts, sacks of circuit boards, cables, batteries and trash contaminated with hazardous and carcinogenic substances.

The company charged customers 500 euros per tonne for environmentally sound disposal. According to the judge, it made almost 400 euros net on every tonne simply by shipping the waste out instead of disposing of it. The remaining hundred euros went to two Czech firms.

The role of the Czech accomplice

Standing trial alongside the director was a Czech man, Vladimír M. The court found that he invented the shell company Piroplastik, which supposedly operated a waste-processing plant in Skalice near Ostrava. “But the plant never worked,” the judge said. Vladimír M. also dealt with the people in charge at the Czech firms and organized the transports, officially receiving only 700 euros a month.

He was sentenced to two years in prison, suspended with a four-year probation period, and ordered to pay three thousand euros in installments of 150 euros a month.

Reaction in the courtroom

Michael R. has been in pretrial detention since August 2025. He answered a Seznam Zprávy reporter with “No comment.” In his final statement he broke into tears and asked for a second chance. The judge did not believe him: “You are not an overburdened businessman let down by subordinates. Everything was done on your instructions. Everything.”

Vladimír M. said he would not comment and was keeping the option of an appeal open. Also in the courtroom was Barbora Šišková, mayor of Jiříkov in the Bruntál region, who personally stopped the trucks in December 2024 and called the police and customs officers, which launched the investigation. “I am satisfied. I am glad justice has prevailed,” she said.

Around Prague guide on the topic: Brno: что посмотреть и куда сходить

Around Prague, based on reporting by seznamzpravy.cz