Michael Bittner (Wall victim)
Michael Bittner (born August 31, 1961 in Berlin ; † November 24, 1986 in Glienicke / Nordbahn ) was a victim of the Berlin Wall . He was shot by members of the GDR border troops while trying to overcome the wall between Glienicke / Nordbahn and Berlin-Frohnau .
Life
After finishing school and completing a bricklayer apprenticeship at VEB Baureparaturen Pankow , he did his 18-month basic military service with the NVA from May 1980 . Due to negative experiences during this time, he decided to leave the GDR and made several applications to leave the country . When his last application was denied, he decided to flee. The last time he met his mother, he didn't mention his plans. However, the next day he told his brother that his application had been approved.
On the evening of November 23, 1986, he went with a ladder to Glienicke / Nordbahn to the wall in West Berlin . Against 1:20 the following day he overcame with the ladder, the hinterland Wall at the Nohlstraße. By touching the signal fence, he triggered the alarm and attracted the attention of two border guards in the GDR. The border guards ran up to Bittner from their location 200 meters away and fired warning shots. When they got within 20 meters of him, Bittner was standing on top of the ladder at the closing wall. After shouts of warning, they opened fire on Bittner, who was hit three times in the back and fell back into the death strip. Michael Bittner died at around 1:50 a.m. of a heart rupture at the regimental medical center in Glienicke. After an autopsy at the Military Medical Academy in Bad Saarow , the body was removed by the Ministry for State Security (MfS) and has since been considered missing.
The GDR authorities and the MfS hushed up Bittner's death. They invented a criminal gang of human traffickers, with whose help Bittner had escaped, and initiated an investigation against the dead, in the course of which the arrest warrant was issued by the Berlin-Mitte district court.
He was one of the 13 people who died while fleeing the GDR, for whose death Erich Honecker was indicted before the Berlin Regional Court in 1992 . The two gunmen were sentenced to youth probation for manslaughter in 1997 because of the shooting .
On November 7, 2009, a square in Glienicke / Nordbahn was named after him in memory of Michael Bittner.
He is also remembered at the memorial for the victims of the Berlin Wall on Edelhofdamm in Berlin-Frohnau, not far from the crime scene at the time.
literature
- Anne Kaminsky: Places of Remembrance. Memorial signs, memorials and museums of the dictatorship in Soviet occupation zone and GDR , Chr. Links Verlag, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-86153-443-3 '
- Hans-Hermann Hertle, Maria Nooke : The victims of the Berlin Wall 1961–1989. A biographical manual . Ch. Links, Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-3-86153-517-1 .
- Stefan Weinert: The family . Documentary from 2013. Basis-Film Verleih GmbH, 10178 Berlin.
Web links
- Brief portrait on www.chronik-der-mauer.de
- Exhibition Exit of the Archive Citizens Movement Leipzig, panels 15 and 16
Individual evidence
- ↑ Article about Michael-Bittner-Platz ( page no longer available , search in web archives ), Glienicker Kurier , December 2009, accessed on February 7, 2011
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Bittner, Michael |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German casualty from the Berlin Wall |
| DATE OF BIRTH | August 31, 1961 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Berlin |
| DATE OF DEATH | November 24, 1986 |
| Place of death | Glienicke / Northern Railway |