Something like this was waiting to happen.

Here's the background: Smoking in Hamburg's public buildings has been banned since January 1. But Hamburg's most famous citizen, ex-chancellor Helmut Schmidt, is also his country's best-known Qualmender (heavy smoker). The leader of West Germany from 1974 to 1982, Schmidt puffs away on menthol ciggies wherever he goes -- no-smoking signs be damned -- except in church and, earlier, in the Bundestag, where he switched to snuff. Hamburg's prestigious weekly newspaper Die Zeit, which Schmidt has co-published since 1983, even launched an interview series with him last year called Auf eine Zigarette mit Helmut Schmidt ("A Cigarette With Helmut Schmidt").

Here's what happened: At a New Year's reception in a Hamburg theater, guests of honor Schmidt and his wife, Loki, also a chain smoker, did what they always do: They lit up. The popular Bild tabloid published pictures of the puffers, prompting a non-smokers group in faraway Wiesbaden to report them to the police for violating the no-smoking ban and "causing bodily harm."

The online edition of the newsmagazine Der Spiegel quoted Hamburg's chief prosecutor as saying late Friday that while smoking was unhealthy, "it is not to be assumed" that the Schmidts caused bodily harm -- certainly not to the people who've accused them. Loki and Smoky, as the Schmidts are fondly known, may yet get nicked for flouting the ban, though.

Loki, by the way, is 88. Smoky, who's had four heart bypass operations and wears a pacemaker, is 89.