Incredible moment son of Michael Schumacher ‘blackmailer’ is dragged off camera by his family’s lawyer while giving blundering TV interview about the case

This is the incredible moment the son of Michael Schumacher’s alleged extortionist was dragged off camera by his family’s lawyer while giving a blundering interview about his father’s case.

Former bodyguard Marcus Fritsche, 53, is on trial alongside his IT expert son Daniel Lins, 30, and his friend, Yilmaz Tozturkan, also 53, after being accused of extorting £12 million from the Schumacher family, who searched after the legendary driver following a life-changing crash he suffered while skiing in the French Alps in 2013.

The trio are said to have demanded the money after Fritsche was fired from his job at the racing ace’s Swiss home in 2021, but not before he 1,500 images, 200 videos and extensive medical notes with him.

The Schumachers have been incredibly protective of Michael since his accident and have not released any photos or interviews about him since the incident.

During an interview outside the courtroom, one of Fritsche’s sons was seen being dragged away from a TV interview.

The son, named by Bild as Noah L., told Welt, a German broadcaster: “Blackmail is when I threaten someone with violence. But if I go to you now and say, “I have something here, would you like to buy it,” that is not blackmail.

‘I think it was a sales pitch, agreed with lawyers and contracts. I don’t think it was blackmail.’

Adding that he found his father’s pre-trial detention “a bit excessive”, the family’s lawyer, Hartmut Moyzio, was seen dragging the son out of the picture and into the courtroom.

Formula 1 world champion Ferrari driver Michael Schumacher (L) poses in Madonna di Campiglio with his wife Corinna January 16, 2003

The interview with the son took place despite the fact that Fritsche reportedly told the Wuppertal court: ‘I take responsibility for it. I did something stupid.’

According to the German newspaper Heute, he turned to the lawyer representing the Schumacher family and said: “Please tell the family that I am really sorry.”

Schumacher’s manager Sabine Kehm, 60, told the court she was the one who received the call about the blackmail plot.

“I got a call and it was a number we didn’t recognize, so at first we didn’t answer, as we normally don’t do with unknown numbers,” she said.

‘But it kept calling and calling so finally I answered and it was a man who said he had pictures of Michael, he said if the family didn’t want them published on the dark web he could help.

‘He said he was an intermediary and that we would have to pay 15 million euros. He said the money was for the photos and his intermediary service.”

The material arrived via a secure email address Lins had set up for his father in June this year, at Schumacher’s office in his family home in Gland, Switzerland. The police were alerted and the trio were arrested two weeks later.

Ms Kehm said: ‘I recognized them as private photos and when I saw them I thought they could only have come from an employee of ours.

Fritsche allegedly recruited his old friend Yilmaz Tozturkan (pictured) and his IT expert son to extort a staggering sum from the family that hired him

For eight years, bodyguard Markus Fritsche was given unique access to the most intimate aspects of the legend’s medical procedures

Markus Fritsche (L), Daniel Lins (fourth from the right with black turtleneck) and Yilmaz Tozturkan (behind) in court today

‘I was sure it had to be someone from our internal circle who worked for us, I was suspicious from the first moment that it was someone who no longer worked for us.’

Ms Kehm described how a nurse involved in Schumacher’s care after his accident ‘seemed to get on very well with Markus Fritsche’.

She added, “I remember always seeing Fritsche and this particular nurse standing together talking.

“But eventually she left, we had issues with her, we had issues with the way care was delivered.”