Thursday will see the opening of a case that may end with the 83-year-old F1 billionaire being imprisoned for 10 years

Bernie Ecclestone, the driving force behind Formula One for almost 40 years, is to stand trial in a bribery case that opens in Munich on Thursday and could result in him being imprisoned for up to 10 years.

The 256-page indictment against the 83-year-old billionaire paints a picture of an autocrat who was so concerned about losing power that he paid part of a $44m (£26m) bribe to a former German banker, Gerhard Gribkowsky, to keep his job.

The case relates to events that led to a private equity firm, CVC, becoming the largest shareholder in Formula One after buying F1's parent company, SLEC Holdings, from Ecclestone's Bambino family trust, and a consortium of three banks. Munich prosecutors claim he bribed Gribkowsky, then chief risk officer of the German lender BayernLB, to steer the motorsport group to CVC because the private equity firm had agreed to retain Ecclestone as F1's chief executive. Gribkowsky is serving an eight-year prison term for tax evasion and corruption in relation to the payment.

Ecclestone argues that he paid Gribkowsky $10m to stop him making false claims about his tax affairs, rather than to favour CVC as a bidder, and denies any wrongdoing.

But prosecutors claim Ecclestone had good reason to bribe the banker. "From the very beginning, the interests held by the majority shareholders in Formula One, ie BayernLB and the other Formula One banks JP Morgan and Lehman, constituted a disturbing factor for the accused," says the indictment against Ecclestone.

Hearings are to be held once or twice a week until September to enable Ecclestone to run Formula One, of which he remains in day-to-day control and negotiates all of the most valuable deals, in a sport with a revenue of $1.6bn a year.

According to the indictment, Ecclestone would not even tell the banks how the motorsport group operated.

"His prominent status and powerful position resulted from the fact that the accused was familiar with the structural details of Formula One and its operating companies, had negotiated, knew and guarded important contracts with partners of the Formula One operating companies, on the basis of which Formula One generated its revenue and disclosure of which, even to SLEC shareholders, he made every effort to avoid, as well as his contacts to close allies in the Formula One scene who played a key role in the marketing sector. All the main operational structures and processes were tailored to suit his individual needs and were in fact controlled by him alone."

Legal action from the banks was the last straw for Ecclestone, according to the indictment. "In view of these circumstances, the accused decided to win over the since-convicted Dr Gribkowsky by offering him the prospect of personal gain in order to end Dr Gribkowsky's confrontational course and dispense with BayernLB as a Formula One shareholder as quickly as possible."

The prosecutors claim Ecclestone paid Gribkowsky to sell F1 to CVC and also convince the BayernLB board to compensate him for the payment. As part of the sale to CVC, Ecclestone was paid a $41m commission by BayernLB for providing a $100m indemnity that F1 was in good health.

The indictment claims that the same course of action was taken by Bambino, which demanded that BayernLB use the proceeds from the sale to repay $25m it was owed by Formula One. The indictment claims Gribkowsky convinced the BayernLB board to agree to this, even though "credible evidence indicating the legal grounds for such payments was still lacking". It adds that "this gave rise to a further damage of $25m for BayernLB."

Last year Ecclestone and Bambino were sued in the high court in London in a related case, which heard allegations about a bribe a German media firm, Constantin Medien, claimed had caused it to make losses because it undervalued Formula One. Although that case was not about whether a bribe was paid, the judge, Mr Justice Newey, said he believed this was what happened but that F1 had not been undervalued. As a result, he ruled against Constantin and provided some support for Ecclestone's defence.

In his judgment Newey said that when CVC bought F1, BayernLB "had the chance to reinvest, but chose not to take it, and the evidence indicates that this was a decision taken against Dr Gribkowsky's wishes rather than because of them." The German indictment, however, states that Ecclestone bribed Gribkowsky so that he could "dispense with BayernLB as a Formula One shareholder".

Ecclestone denies paying a bribe and says that Gribkowsky threatened to tell HM Revenue & Customs that he controlled Bambino if the $44m was not paid.

As Ecclestone is a UK resident he would be liable to pay tax on the estimated $4bn of cash in Bambino's accounts if he were found to be in control of it, which he strongly denies. He says he paid Gribkowsky because his unfounded allegations would have triggered a lengthy and costly investigation.

Ecclestone says legal advice prevents him from commenting on the latest case.