Prison Bautzen II

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Bautzen II prison, 1910

The Bautzen II prison was a prison in Bautzen that existed from 1906 to 1992 in what is now Bautzen's Nordostring district .

From 1956 until the end of the GDR, Bautzen II was under the control of the Ministry for State Security (MfS) as a special prison and was expanded into a high-security wing with 200 prison places for special political prisoners (“Stasi prison”). Bautzen II became known for the inhumane accommodation (prisoners were sometimes only addressed by their number) by regime critics, West German, foreign and prominent GDR prisoners. In 1963 the institution was separated from the Bautzen I detention center , the so-called “Yellow Misery”, and run as an independent penal institution. As a camouflage, the Bautzen II prison remained nominally an institution of the Ministry of the Interior .

In 1989 all political prisoners were released. In 1992 the Bautzen II facility was finally closed. The Bautzen memorial has been located in the building since 1993, and is also the location of the Saxon Memorials Foundation to commemorate the victims of political tyranny .

history

Judicial prison 1906–1933

Construction of the justice building with detention center in Bautzen, 1905

The Ministry of Justice of the Kingdom of Saxony built the Bautzen II facility with the district and regional court from 1904 to 1906. The prison had 203 places in 157  cells . These were used for pre- trial detention as well as for the custody of prisoners with short sentences. The equipment of the Bautzen court prison was modernly equipped at the time of opening, including a. there was steam air heating and electric lighting. The prison capacity limit of the building was never reached, however, the prison was often only a third full. For this reason, from May 1916, the German Army imprisoned military personnel in Bautzen II.

In 1923, Bautzen I and Bautzen II were amalgamated to form the “United Prisons” of the Ministry of Justice. The liberalization of the prison system in the Weimar Republic from 1924 led to the strengthening of prisoner rights and the improvement of prison conditions in Bautzen II.

Prison for judicial and protective prisoners 1933–1945

Bautzen II became part of the Bautzen State Prison Center in 1933 and continued to serve as a department for pre-trial detention and shorter prison sentences. Along with the National Socialist reform of the penal code, political opponents of the Nazi regime were increasingly taken into “ protective custody ” in Bautzen II . In addition, the guards frequently mistreated the prisoners. From 1941 resistance fighters from the occupied territories were also imprisoned in Bautzen II . For many of these "protective prisoners", Bautzen was a stopover to the concentration camps Kupferhammer ( Bautzen ) and Hohnstein . With the approach of the Red Army , the court prison was evacuated in 1945.

Soviet remand prison 1945–1949

Bautzen II

After the end of the war, the operational group of the Soviet secret police used the empty court prison from June 1945 to hold detainees on remand and for interrogations. These prisons were popularly called "GPU basements". The individual cells were overcrowded and the hygienic conditions were miserable. There was hardly enough food for the numerous arrested people. If necessary , the NKVD extorted confessions about the frequently fabricated charges with torture. A Soviet military tribunal was meeting in the neighboring courthouse . The SMT convicts and internees imprisoned in Bautzen II were then transferred to the special camp in Bautzen. In September 1949, the Soviet secret service handed the house over to the Saxon justice administration. The judicial prison was now a correctional facility and a judicial remand prison . 1950 took over the Interior Ministry in the GDR , which now total for the prison was responsible, the prison.

Branch office of Bautzen I 1951–1956

In 1951, the court prison was taken over by the GDR Interior Ministry, which was now responsible for the execution of sentences, and returned to the Bautzen I branch as "Object II".

Special detention center of the State Security 1956–1989

The separated courtyards of the isolation prisoners

In 1956 the MfS set up a special penal facility in Bautzen II. Bautzen II was expanded into a shielded, high-security prison with 200 prison places and was used to hold special inmates such as state criminals , West Germans , foreigners as well as former MfS employees and SED officials who had committed criminal offenses . Bautzen II was separated from Bautzen I in 1963 and operated as an independent penal institution. Formally it remained an institution of the Ministry of the Interior, but in fact the main decision-making and control powers lay with the MfS. It decided who came to Bautzen II, monitored the staff and interrogated the prisoners. From 1963, female prisoners were also imprisoned in Bautzen II. This made it the only prison in the GDR in which women and men were held under one roof. An average of 150 people were imprisoned in Bautzen II. The peak was reached in July 1962 with 260 prisoners.

In the Bautzen II institution there were repeated abuse of prisoners by staff. Although these constituted a violation of the GDR's penal law, they were not prosecuted in the GDR. The isolation of some prisoners with accommodation in the separate isolation wing and free access in individual courtyards also contradicted current GDR law. This led to protests by human rights organizations such as Amnesty International or the ISHR , which in the 1970s distributed thousands of leaflets in Germany demanding the release of political prisoners in Bautzen II.

The prisoner Dieter Hötger managed the only escape from Bautzen II on November 28, 1967, and was arrested after nine days of escape.

Monday demonstration in front of Bautzen II, December 4, 1989
Prisoners' hunger and labor strike, 1990

In the 1970s, the MfS began extensive acoustic and visual surveillance of prisoners with the help of video technology and bugs . These controls were reinforced by a network of inmate spies (“cell informators”) and by post censorship . But the GDR also tried to improve the conditions of detention during this time, so the heating was modernized and the cells were given a sink and toilet. Since 1978 diplomatic representatives of the FRG and other western states have been able to visit their prisoners in Bautzen. In addition, an evangelical pastor looked after the prisoners from 1979 , but he worked as an unofficial employee (IM) for the MfS.

On December 3, 1989, citizens of Bautzen demonstrated for the first time in front of Bautzen II for the release of political prisoners. The prisoners went on hunger and labor strikes and a prison council was established. The prison opened to the public for the first time with a press conference on December 6th. Three days later, a West German camera team also got access to the Bautzen II institution for the first time and interviewed prisoners and staff. By December 22nd, all political prisoners from Bautzen II were finally released.

Branch office of the Bautzen correctional facility 1990–1992

After the political prisoners were released, there were still 29 (mainly criminal) prisoners in Bautzen II. From July 1990 it became a Saxon penal institution and branch office of Bautzen I. In January 1992 the institution was finally closed, the remaining prisoners were moved to Bautzen I. Numerous prisoners filed charges against employees in Bautzen II for abuse they had suffered. However, a former station manager was convicted in only one case.

Bautzen memorial

In 1992 the Bautzen II prison was closed due to its special importance as a place of political imprisonment. In 1993 the Bautzen Memorial was established here , which has set itself the task of remembering the victims of both Bautzen prisons.

Prominent inmates

Julius Fučík memorial area in Bautzen II, 1979

The years of imprisonment in Bautzen II are given in brackets.

Prison of the Nazi regime (1933–1945)

Special prison of the MfS (1956–1989)

literature

  • Karl Wilhelm Fricke : Human penal system and political abuse. On the history of the penal institutions in Bautzen from 1904 to 2000 . In: Sächsisches Staatsministerium der Justiz (Hrsg.): Sächsische Justizgeschichte . tape 10 . Dresden 1999.
  • Norbert Haase, Klaus-Dieter Müller: Ways to Bautzen II. Biographical and autobiographical portraits . In: Stiftung Sächsische Gedenkstätten (Hrsg.): Testimonials - Paths of suffering . Issue 8. Dresden 2003, ISBN 3-9805527-7-2 .
  • Karl Wilhelm Fricke, Silke Klewin : Bautzen II. Special detention center under MfS control 1956 to 1989. Report and documentation . In: Stiftung Sächsische Gedenkstätten (Hrsg.): Series of publications by the Stiftung Sächsische Gedenkstätten in memory of the victims of political tyranny . tape 8 . Sandstein Verlag, Dresden 2007, ISBN 978-3-940319-24-1 .
  • Susanne Hattig, Silke Klewin, Cornelia Liebold, Jörg Morré: Stasi prison Bautzen II 1956–1989. Catalog for the exhibition at the Bautzen Memorial . In: Stiftung Sächsische Gedenkstätten (Hrsg.): Series of publications by the Stiftung Sächsische Gedenkstätten in memory of the victims of political tyranny . tape 13 . Sandstein Verlag, Dresden 2008, ISBN 978-3-937602-98-1 .
  • Rengha Rodewill : Bautzen II - Documentary exploration in photos with eyewitness accounts and a foreword by Gesine Schwan . Ed .: Agency Wort + Kunst, Micaela Porcelli. Past Publishing , Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-86408-119-4 .
  • Rengha Rodewill: Bautzen II Mit Stasi headquarters - photo documentation, contemporary witness reports (e-book), artesinex eBook publishing, Berlin 2019, ISBN 978-3-9820572-8-6 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ http://www.uokg.de/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=46:bautzen-ia-ii&catid=31:gedenkstaetten&Itemid=49
  2. ^ Karl Wilhelm Fricke: Humaner penal system and political abuse. On the history of the penal institutions in Bautzen 1904 to 2000. 1999, pp. 54–57.
  3. ^ Karl Wilhelm Fricke: Humaner penal system and political abuse. On the history of the penal institutions in Bautzen 1904 to 2000. 1999, pp. 70–81.
  4. ^ Karl Wilhelm Fricke: Humaner penal system and political abuse. On the history of the penal institutions in Bautzen 1904 to 2000. 1999, pp. 86–92.
  5. ^ Karl Wilhelm Fricke: Humaner penal system and political abuse. On the history of the penal institutions in Bautzen 1904 to 2000. 1999, pp. 101–110.
  6. ^ A b Karl Wilhelm Fricke: Humaner penal system and political abuse. On the history of the penal institutions in Bautzen 1904 to 2000. 1999, p. 145.
  7. ^ Karl Wilhelm Fricke, Silke Klewin: Bautzen II. Special Detention Center under MfS control 1956 to 1989. Report and documentation. 2007, pp. 18-20.
  8. ↑ Susanne Hattig, Silke Klewin, Cornelia Liebold, Jörg Morré: Stasi prison Bautzen II 1956–1989. Catalog for the exhibition at the Bautzen Memorial. 2008, p. 41.
  9. ↑ Susanne Hattig, Silke Klewin, Cornelia Liebold, Jörg Morré: Stasi prison Bautzen II 1956-1989. Catalog for the exhibition at the Bautzen Memorial. 2008, pp. 66-73.
  10. ↑ Susanne Hattig, Silke Klewin, Cornelia Liebold, Jörg Morré: Stasi prison Bautzen II 1956-1989. Catalog for the exhibition at the Bautzen Memorial. 2008, pp. 104-105.
  11. ↑ Susanne Hattig, Silke Klewin, Cornelia Liebold, Jörg Morré: Stasi prison Bautzen II 1956–1989. Catalog for the exhibition at the Bautzen Memorial. 2008, p. 203.
  12. ^ Karl Wilhelm Fricke, Silke Klewin: Bautzen II. Special Detention Center under MfS control 1956 to 1989. Report and documentation. 2007, p. 145.
  13. ↑ Susanne Hattig, Silke Klewin, Cornelia Liebold, Jörg Morré: Stasi prison Bautzen II 1956-1989. Catalog for the exhibition at the Bautzen Memorial. 2008, pp. 71-79.
  14. ↑ Susanne Hattig, Silke Klewin, Cornelia Liebold, Jörg Morré: Stasi prison Bautzen II 1956–1989. Catalog for the exhibition at the Bautzen Memorial. 2008, pp. 112-119.

Coordinates: 51 ° 10 ′ 40.8 "  N , 14 ° 26 ′ 11.2"  E