Schröder's artist friend caught in sex, drug scandal:

"Immendorf refused to comment on the police raid, but friends say he is 'very frightened' of being victimised by the media.

The artist, a professor at Dusseldorf's Academy of Arts, rose to prominence in the 1970s as one of the Jungen Wilden (young wild ones) group of artists.

A former Left-wing Maoist activist who also owned a well-known bar in Hamburg's red-light district, he is best known for his painting Cafe Deutschland, which takes Germany's post-war division as its main subject. He attracted widespread media coverage two years ago when he married one of his students, Oda Jaune, who is 30 years his junior.

Immendorf's rebel image attracted the attention of Chancellor Schröder, who has made a habit of entertaining Left-wing artists, writers and intellectuals with supposedly 'progressive' views since he was first elected five years ago. "