Georg Gaidzik

This article or the following section is not adequately provided with supporting documents ( e.g. individual evidence ). Information without sufficient evidence could be removed soon. Please help Wikipedia by researching the information and including good evidence.

Georg Gaidzik (born February 9, 1921 in Miechowitz , Upper Silesia , † June 17, 1953 in Magdeburg ) was a people's police officer and was killed in the GDR uprising on June 17, 1953 .

Life

Gaidzik first attended elementary school , then learned blacksmithing and then worked in mining .

He took part in World War II as a German soldier and was taken prisoner by the Soviets . There he was honored as an “ activist ” three times in four and a half years .

After returning to Germany in 1950, he became a people's policeman in the GDR.

June 17, 1953

On June 17, 1953, a popular uprising against the SED- led government broke out in the GDR . At that time, Gaidzik was chief sergeant and was on guard duty in the Magdeburg-Sudenburg prison . Parts of the insurgents decided to storm the prison. Some carried firearms that had previously been taken from the People's Police. The guards were shot at through the prison gate and from the adjacent courthouse. Three servants, in addition to Gaidzik, Gerhard Händler and Johann Waldbach , received fatal injuries. Gaidzik was fatally shot in the neck between 10 a.m. and 12 noon. The grave is located in the Neustädter Friedhof in Magdeburg (grave number AR 16/706).

process

After the popular uprising was put down, Ernst Jennrich was arrested on June 19, 1953 and charged with firing the fatal shot. In the trial against Jennrich, a people's policeman testified: “The demonstrators managed to damage the gate so that an opening measuring 60 x 60 cm was created. Then a shot came from outside through this opening. I shot back and hit the shooter in the left leg. Then another man tried to shoot. However, before the shot was fired, my shot hit him in the left leg. Since I noticed that there was danger from behind, as the crowd had already crossed the wall, I went to the rear to support the other comrades here. At our persuasion, the crowd withdrew again. I wanted to go back to the gate. At that moment I saw someone sticking a carbine through the left window from outside. At the same moment the shot was fired and the VP Obm. Gaidzik, who was standing at the gate of the 2nd courtyard, sank to the ground. "

Jennrich denied the perpetrator. He actually wanted to go to the city council on June 17, 1953, but then joined the demonstration. In front of the prison he had stolen a rifle from a youth to stop the shooting. However, at the energetic insistence of the masses, he then fired an untargeted shot.

The district court of Magdeburg sentenced Jennrich to life imprisonment for boycotting . The public prosecutor's office is appealing against this. The Supreme Court of the GDR overturned the judgment and referred it back to the district court, with the proviso that the death penalty appeared appropriate. In a hearing that lasted 15 minutes, the district court actually handed down the death penalty.

Ernst Jennrich was on 20 March 1954, the guillotine executed.

After the end of the GDR, he was posthumously acquitted on August 20, 1991 . The public prosecutor's office was investigating the judges who issued the original verdict. However, these were already dead. The actual shooter was never determined.

Honor

On June 30, 1954, at the request of the People's Police (on the occasion of the “People's Police Day”), the city council of Magdeburg decided to rename Seehäuser Straße to Georg-Gaidzik-Straße . After the end of the GDR it was renamed back to Seehäuser Straße. A square near the complex, which was used as a prison until around 2010 , was named June 17th Square .