Herbert Pätzel

Herbert Pätzel (born August 23, 1933 in Nowawes ) was deputy head of the Investigation Department (HA IX) of the Ministry for State Security (MfS) from 1975 to 1979 . He worked as an interrogator in the Stasi remand prison in Berlin-Hohenschönhausen .

Life

After graduating from high school, Pätzel joined the MfS at the age of 20. Initially active in the service of the Potsdam district administration , in 1954 he moved to the investigation department in Berlin-Hohenschönhausen. According to his cadre files, he was “a role model for his employees through his intensive and persistent interrogation work”. He worked his way up to head of department before he was appointed head of main department IX / 5 in 1964. He was also promoted to the rank of colonel. For his collective doctoral thesis at the Stasi University in Potsdam on the subject of "The qualification of preventive and offensive combat against subversive activities of covert warfare under the current conditions of the class struggle" he invented a never-existing agent ring in 1974. In the course of the operational procedure "Waldläufer" initiated for this purpose , he had a total of twelve people arrested and tried to extort false confessions in hours of interrogation. Some of them were sentenced to long prison terms.

When this became known in 1979, one criminal placed him because of "severe manipulation of investigation results" as officer on special assignment to the GDR - State Archives . In November 1999 the Berlin Regional Court sentenced him to 20 months imprisonment on probation for extorting testimony on several occasions. A second procedure for extortion of testimony and perversion of justice, which was started in June 1995, remained largely unprocessed until spring 2000 due to overloading of the judicial authorities. When the main hearing was set for July 20, 2000, Pätzel went into hiding and was wanted on an arrest warrant. He only reappeared after the proceedings were discontinued on October 4 due to the statute of limitations.

Individual evidence

↑ ^a ^b cf. Hubertus Knabe : The perpetrators are among us. About the glossing over of the SED dictatorship . 2nd edition Propylaen-Verlag, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-549-07302-5 , p. 108f.
↑ Cf. Günter Förster: The legal college of the Ministry for State Security (studies on GDR society; 6). Lit-Verlag, Münster 2001, ISBN 3-8258-4589-3 , p. 485.
↑ Cf. Roger Engelmann , Clemens Vollnhals (ed.): Justice in the service of party rule. Legal Practice and State Security in the GDR (analyzes and documents; 16). Links-Verlag, Berlin 1999, ISBN 3-86153-184-4 , p. 248.
↑ ^a ^b cf. Peter Wensierski : Tunnel to Thuringia . In: Der Spiegel , Vol. 54 (2000), No. 39 of September 25, 2000.
↑ See Klaus Marxen , Gerhard Werle (Ed.): Criminal Justice and GDR Injustice. Documentation, Volume 5, Part 2: Perversion of the law . DeGruyter, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-89949-241-5 , p. 1087.

personal data
SURNAME	Pätzel, Herbert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German Stasi employee, deputy head of Department XIV of the Ministry for State Security
DATE OF BIRTH	August 23, 1933
PLACE OF BIRTH	Nowawes

[knabe-1] . Hubertus Knabe : The perpetrators are among us. About the glossing over of the SED dictatorship . 2nd edition Propylaen-Verlag, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-549-07302-5 , p. 108f.

[2] Cf. Günter Förster: The legal college of the Ministry for State Security (studies on GDR society; 6). Lit-Verlag, Münster 2001, ISBN 3-8258-4589-3 , p. 485.

[3] Cf. Roger Engelmann , Clemens Vollnhals (ed.): Justice in the service of party rule. Legal Practice and State Security in the GDR (analyzes and documents; 16). Links-Verlag, Berlin 1999, ISBN 3-86153-184-4 , p. 248.

[Wensierski-4] . Peter Wensierski : Tunnel to Thuringia . In: Der Spiegel , Vol. 54 (2000), No. 39 of September 25, 2000.

[5] See Klaus Marxen , Gerhard Werle (Ed.): Criminal Justice and GDR Injustice. Documentation, Volume 5, Part 2: Perversion of the law . DeGruyter, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-89949-241-5 , p. 1087.