A sports champion, a banking chief and even a former chancellor have benefited from the German legal proviso that enabled Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone to walk out of court with a clean slate.

After a $US100-million ($A108 million) payment, bribery charges that 83-year-old Ecclestone had been standing trial on since April were dismissed by the Munich court.

As spectacular and controversial as it has proven, such accords are not without precedent in Germany.

The British billionaire, who has enjoyed a four-decade grip on Formula One, joins other high-profile figures to have had legal proceedings dropped under the provision in the German judicial system.

At $US100 million, the Ecclestone accord is believed the biggest by far in German legal criminal history.

In 2006 former Deutsche Bank chief Josef Ackermann had breach of trust charges dismissed after a 3.2-million-euros ($A4.8 million) settlement.

Ex-chancellor Helmut Kohl also saw a prosecution case against him closed in 2001 over secret funding of the Christian Democratic Union under his leadership in exchange for payment of 300,000 deutschmarks (about $A225,000).

The move meant Kohl avoided conviction for breach of trust towards the party. But the scandal seriously dented his reputation and his conservatives’ credibility.

And German cycling champion Jan Ullrich agreed a 250,000-euro settlement in a suspected doping case in 2006.

Under German law, the outcome of criminal proceedings – in terms of a punishment and, albeit less commonly, in the halting of proceedings – can be negotiated in certain cases to avoid long and costly court cases.

Every year tens of thousands of proceedings are halted under the legal provision but usually concern lesser charges such as hit-and-run cases which have resulted in material damage.

Any settlement – which the defence, prosecution and the court must all agree to, and which is calculated according to a defendant’s financial means – should take into account the public interest and the gravity of guilt.

Decided on a case-by-case basis, the money paid can go into the coffers of the region where the trial was held – in the Ecclestone case, to southern Bavaria state – or, if the parties agree, be donated to a charity.

Former justice minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger, who on Monday criticised the possible Ecclestone settlement and has also been critical of the legal proviso, acknowledged it was “not enforceable” to repeal the practice as it was too engrained.