His journalistic work is intertwined with a name: Lucona. The name of the cargo that exploded and sank in the Indian Ocean on 23 January 1977.
Six of the 12 crew members die. Insurance fraud, as it turns out – especially based on his research: Hans Pretterebner. The journalist covers the issue together with the domestic policy director Weekly press, Gerald Freihofnerone of the biggest scandals of the Second Republic, in its midst Udo Proksch stands.
Proksch will be convicted of murder in 1992, high-ranking SPÖ politicians like Karl Blecha and Leopold Gratz they will resign because of their involvement in the situation.
Pretterebner’s bookLucona case. eastern espionage, corruption and murder in the orbit of the supreme government” becomes the Best Seller, it made him famous and in 1993 he was the subject of the film (“The Lucona Case”), directed by Jack Gold oh what David Suchet, Jürgen Prochnow and Franco Nero.
From November 7, 1994 to September 28, 1995, Pretterebner was also a member of the FPÖ in the Austrian National Council.
The man who was born in Haselsdorf near Graz in 1944 died on October 12.