Lutz Schmidt
Lutz Schmidt (born July 8, 1962 in Zittau , † February 12, 1987 in Berlin ) was a victim of the Berlin Wall . Members of the GDR border troops shot him while trying to escape.
Life
Lutz Schmidt was a cyclist since his youth. At the age of 14 he went to SC Dynamo Berlin . He graduated from the club's youth sports school. When he refused to join the SED , his sports career ended. At the age of 18 he met his future wife Karin, the single mother of a daughter. With her he had a son. With an apprenticeship as an assembly fitter , he reoriented himself professionally. After his military service in the National People's Army , he took a job at Auto Trans Berlin, as it saw better chances of obtaining material for a planned house construction.
The couple had contacts in the Federal Republic and the United States, through which they recognized the different ways of life in East and West. They decided to look for their future in the West, but because of the expected disadvantages they did not want to submit an official application to leave the country . After her first attempt failed with a request for a visit, Lutz Schmidt was initially to flee alone and the family would follow later. After various escape plans, Lutz Schmidt decided to try to escape over the wall together with a work colleague. They chose February 12, 1987, as West German politicians were due to visit East Berlin on that day and the foggy weather offered better camouflage. Shortly before the border in the Altglienicke district (Treptow district), the two of them almost collided with their truck with a radio patrol car and came off the road. When their truck got stuck, they jumped out of the car and ran to the border strip with the ladders they had carried. The people's police informed the border guards nearby.
Arrived at the border, Lutz Schmidt and his companion climbed the ladders over the signal fence and ran on towards the wall. One of their ladders got caught in the barbed wire fence. They put the remaining ladder against the wall, but it slipped off, leaving a distance of two meters from the top of the wall. Lutz Schmidt helped his companion up. But Lutz Schmidt was unable to follow suit. During a renewed attempt, the escort fell from the wall on the West Berlin side while Lutz Schmidt was shot at by approaching border guards and suffered a hit in the heart. He died on the spot.
The Ministry of State Security obliged Karin Schmidt to keep silent about the circumstances of death and to tell friends that it had been a traffic accident. The wall shots caused great media interest in the West; Lutz Schmidt's name was only known later. The Berlin public prosecutor brought charges against the two border guards, who were awarded the medal for exemplary border service for the death of Lutz Schmidt , in a wall rifle trial in the Berlin district court in 1993 . In 1995 the verdict was issued for community manslaughter with a two-year suspended prison sentence. Karin Schmidt appeared as a joint plaintiff in the trial and in other trials against members of the SED Politburo .
On August 13, 2009, the former Rheingoldstrasse in Berlin-Altglienicke, where Lutz Schmidt was shot, was renamed Lutz-Schmidt-Strasse. There is also a memorial stele that commemorates the events.
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Schmidt, Lutz |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German casualty from the Berlin Wall |
| DATE OF BIRTH | July 8, 1962 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Zittau |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 12, 1987 |
| Place of death | Berlin |