Petra Schelm

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Petra Schelm (born August 16, 1950 in Hamburg ; † July 15, 1971 there ) was a German member of the left-wing extremist terrorist organization Red Army Fraction (RAF). She was killed in an exchange of fire with the police and was the first RAF member to die in a police operation.

Early years

Schelm had trained as a hairdresser because she wanted to work as a make- up artist later . After completing her apprenticeship, she worked for a time in a craft shop. Then she got a job as a companion for an American travel company. She then lived in a commune in Berlin and was involved in the extra-parliamentary opposition . It was here that she met her friend Manfred Grashof . She should work with Ulrike Meinhof and Horst Mahler in the renting and living working group in Berlin's Märkisches Viertel, who was committed to the “rehabilitation of marginalized social groups”, have been active. However, the extent of their involvement in the working group has not been clarified. An employee at the time told Spiegel : “Actually I should know her, but I don't know her.” In June 1970, she traveled via East Berlin to Jordan , where she and other RAF members received military training in a camp. Due to various differences with the host, the Palestinian Fatah , the training was terminated prematurely. The group returned to Berlin in August 1970. In the spring of 1971, the Federal Court of Justice issued an arrest warrant for Petra Schelm and included her photo in a wanted information sheet. This was justified with the suspicion that her acquaintance with Ulrike Meinhof and her environment could have developed into involvement in a criminal organization.

When Petra Schelm died, contact with her parents had been broken for a long time. She had introduced them to Manfred Grashof, who asked the father for his daughter's hand. When he refused to give his consent, it came to a break.

death

House on Reineckestrasse in Hamburg, in front of which the fatal shot fell
53 ° 34 ′ 0.7 ″  N , 9 ° 54 ′ 13.4 ″  E
Grave of Petra Schelm

As part of a large manhunt throughout northern Germany for around fifty members of the RAF, Schelm, accompanied by RAF member Werner Hoppe, broke through a roadblock in Hamburg's Stresemannstrasse with her car on July 15, 1971. After a chase, the vehicle was stopped in Bahrenfeld Kirchenweg. Hoppe and Schelm jumped out of the vehicle, fired several times at the police who were chasing them, according to the police, and fled on foot via Von-Sauer-Strasse into Reineckestrasse. In the gardens behind the street Hoppe and Schelm parted. Back on Reineckestrasse, Petra Schelm was discovered by one of the police officers and called. In the following exchange of fire, she was hit by a bullet from a submachine gun diagonally under the left eye and fatally injured. According to the shooter, Schelm fired first, but a student standing nearby said that the policeman was the first to shoot without warning.

According to eyewitness reports, Petra Schelm lay on the pavement for at least 10 minutes after the fatal shot without first aid being given. The shooter took part in the pursuit of Werner Hoppe, who was overpowered and arrested a few minutes later in the swamp behind the highway. The police initially believed that the dead person was Ulrike Meinhof . Accordingly, the DPA reported Meinhof's death at 4:16 p.m., but denied it at 4:28 p.m.

Petra Schelm was buried in the “In den Kisseln” cemetery in Berlin.

Together with a number of other cases of fatal shots by German police officers, Schelm's death in 1971 sparked a public discussion about intensifying training for German police officers to shoot.

As a prelude to the May offensive of the Red Army Faction , the "Petra Schelm Command" carried out an attack on the headquarters of the V Corps of the US Armed Forces in Frankfurt am Main on May 11, 1972 . American Lieutenant Colonel Paul A. Bloomquist was killed and thirteen other people were injured in the explosion of three bombs .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Stefan Aust: The Baader Meinhof Complex. P. 188.
  2. ↑ Password Kora . In: Der Spiegel . No. 30 , 1971, p. 28 f . ( online - July 19, 1971 ).
  3. ↑ Stefan Aust: The Baader Meinhof Complex. P. 121ff.
  4. ↑ Stefan Aust: The Baader Meinhof Complex. P. 125ff.
  5. ↑ Stefan Aust: The Baader Meinhof Complex. P. 188f.
  6. ↑ Michael Sontheimer: Beginnings of the RAF: fatal shots in the side street. In: Spiegel Online . July 15, 2011, accessed on November 9, 2020 (with photo gallery).
  7. ↑ Password Kora . In: Der Spiegel . No. 30 , 1971, p. 28 f . ( online - July 19, 1971 ).
  8. ↑ Trembling hand . In: Der Spiegel . No. 34 , 1971, p. 30 ( Online - Aug. 16, 1971 ).
  9. ↑ Red Army Faction, Petra Schelm Command: Explanation. (May 14, 1972) In: Christiane Schneider (Ed.): Selected documents of contemporary history: Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) - Red Army Fraction (RAF). Verlagsgesellschaft Politischeberichte, Cologne 1987, ISBN 3-926922-00-1 , p. 27 ( as HTML ), quoted by: Martin Hoffmann (Ed.): Red Army Fraction. Texts and materials on the history of the RAF. ID-Verlag, Berlin 1997, ISBN 3-89408-065-5 , p. 145 ( as PDF, 1.46 MB ).
  10. ^ "Red Army Fraction" (RAF) , State Office for the Protection of the Constitution in Baden-Württemberg
personal data
SURNAME Rogue, Petra
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German terrorist of the Red Army faction
DATE OF BIRTH August 16, 1950
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamburg
DATE OF DEATH 15th July 1971
PLACE OF DEATH Hamburg