Prison Moabit

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Prison Moabit
JVA Moabit between the street Alt-Moabit (left) and the Rathenower street
Information about the institution
Surname Prison Moabit
Reference year 1881
Detention places 971
Criminal Court Building, 1882, between Alt-Moabit Street (left) and Rathenower Strasse; the prison complex is at the back
Outer facade of the new southern wing along the Alt-Moabit street

The Moabit correctional facility (JVA Moabit) in the Berlin district of Moabit in the Mitte district was built as the royal remand prison in the Moabit district in the years 1877–1881 and is now a listed building . During the time of National Socialism , many opponents of the regime were imprisoned in Moabit .

Today, as a closed prison facility in Berlin, it is responsible for male adults from the age of 21 for the implementation of remand and extradition detention. In particular, people are admitted here for the execution of custodial sentences in the admission procedure (without self-employed persons), as well as prisoners who have special security requirements for special reasons. The JVA Moabit has 971 detention places divided into four sub-institutions.

Building history

The royal remand prison in the district of Moabit was built together with the old criminal court building between 1877 and 1881 by senior building director Heinrich Herrmann with the help of August Busse . The occupancy took place from September 9, 1881. The complex initially included the five-beam, star-shaped panoptic men’s prison, the “small men’s prison” with an infirmary, the so-called “women’s prison”, a kitchen wing, administration building and civil servants' residence. The "small male prison" was expanded, rebuilt and converted into a central prison hospital in 1913. Today it is no longer used as such, as a central detention hospital was built in Plötzensee. From 1884 the penitentiary reformer Carl Krohne headed the institution.

The first criminal biological research center in Prussia was established here as part of the penal reforms in the 1930s .

In the Second World War , the representative head building with the courtrooms was almost completely destroyed. From 1955 to 1962 Prison II was restored. In the years that followed, extensive renovation and modernization measures were carried out.

The part of the building visible today is an arched rear building facing the former inner courtyard. The three other wings of the old building, which had enclosed the courtyard, were replaced by a new building and walls. At both ends of the remaining building, the half-cylinders can still be seen that connected the common stairwells with the wings on the street side. Rathenower Strasse originally ran in a straight line along the northern side wing and merged further east into Alt-Moabit Street . Today this street is car-friendly over the area of ​​the old main building with a triangular decorative square in front of it and is directly connected to Paulstraße. What is less well known is that behind the visible arched wing there is still the historical facility, consisting of five cell tracts in the shape of a star - similar to the nearby Lehrter Strasse cell prison  .

The direct structural connection with the Moabit Criminal Court is still in use today, making it possible to lead prisoners on remand into the courtroom within the building complex.

Prominent prisoners

After German reunification (1989/1990), the prison became known, among other things, for the imprisonment of members of the SED leadership and the GDR leadership elite. Were imprisoned there

Web links

Commons : Prison Moabit  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Mysterious places on daserste.de

Coordinates: 52 ° 31 '28.9 "  N , 13 ° 21' 17.1"  E