Volker Speitel

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Volker Speitel (* 1950 ) is a former member of the left-wing extremist terrorist organization Red Army Fraction (RAF) and is part of its second generation. He was sentenced to three years and two months in prison in 1977 for membership in a terrorist organization . After his arrest in October 1977, Speitel became one of the prosecutor's most important witnesses and provided extensive information about what was going on within the RAF. He revealed how firearms and explosives were smuggled into the JVA Stuttgart- Stammheim in prepared files. The imprisoned RAF leaders Andreas Baader and Jan-Carl Raspe shot each other with two of the weapons on the so-called night of death in Stammheim on October 18, 1977.

Life

Speitel learned the profession of graphic designer . Since 1969 he was married to Angelika Speitel , who later also became a member of the RAF. In the early 1970s, Speitel lived in a shared flat in Stuttgart with Christof Wackernagel , Siegfried Hausner , Willy Peter Stoll and his wife. He was initially involved in the prisoner aid organization Rote Hilfe and later in the so-called "Committees against the torture of political prisoners in the FRG", which criticized the prison conditions of the first generation of the RAF. From 1973 Speitel worked in the law firm of Jörg Lang and Klaus Croissant . After Jörg Lang , who was an important reference person for Speitel, went illegally, he took over part of his duties.

In such a hiding place in the files, Volker Speitel said he had deposited the weapons with which Andreas Baader and Jan-Carl Raspe shot each other on the so-called death night of Stammheim in 1977.

According to his own statement, he later prepared the files of the lawyers Arndt Müller and Armin Newerla with, among other things, three firearms and 650 grams of explosives, which were smuggled into the Stuttgart prison to the first-generation terrorists imprisoned.

The death of Holger Meins in November 1974 was a key experience for Speitel. Through contact with the Heidelberg lawyer Siegfried Haag , Andreas Baader's defender , he joined the RAF and lived briefly with a group of illegals in Frankfurt.

About joining the group, he later said:

“Joining the group, absorbing their norms and the gun on the belt develop him, the 'new' person. He has become master of life and death, determines what is good and bad, takes what he needs and from whom he wants it; he is judge, dictator and God in one person - albeit for the price that he can only be so for a short time. "

In 1975 Speitel returned to Stuttgart and was responsible for courier and messenger services between the imprisoned and free RAF members. According to Speitel, the law firm Croissant was the center for communication between the imprisoned first and active second generation of the RAF.

Speitel was arrested on October 2, 1977 on a train in Puttgarden .

He was indicted along with Hans-Joachim Dellwo in December 1977. Speitel renounced the RAF in the fall of 1977 and testified extensively. He put a considerable strain on Peter-Jürgen Boock , Gert Schneider and Christof Wackernagel . The judicial review of his statements was limited by interrogation of witnesses abroad, because Speitel - despite court summons - did not appear to some court proceedings and the Federal Minister of the Interior refused to provide an "summonsable" address. Speitel's statements are important for understanding what happened on the night of the death in Stammheim .

Speitel was sentenced to three years and two months in prison on December 14, 1978 for membership in a terrorist group after he had provided extensive information which had a mitigating effect. Individual offenses were not charged.

On September 1, 1979 Speitel was released and went underground with the help of the witness protection program of the Federal Criminal Police Office . At first, Speitel went into hiding under another name with the help of the authorities in Brazil, where he ran an advertising agency. After a short time, his company received orders from VW do Brasil. However, since there was a risk of discovery in Brazil, Speitel moved back to Germany. Under the name Thomas Keller, he became head of advertising at the trailer manufacturer Westfalia in 1985 .

In 1980 Der Spiegel published Speitel's autobiographical text in three parts with the title “We wanted everything and nothing at the same time. Volker Speitel on his experiences in the West German urban guerrilla ".

Individual evidence

  1. Martin Knobbe: The prosecutor and his informant. In: Focus , April 27, 2007.
  2. Tobias Wunschik: Baader-Meinhof's children. The second generation of the RAF ; Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1997; P. 205f.
  3. Tobias Wunschik: Baader-Meinhof's children. The second generation of the RAF ; Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1997; P. 206.
  4. Volker Speitel: We wanted everything and nothing at the same time. (Interview with Speitel) In: Der Spiegel No. 32/1980, pp. 30–39, see also the first and third parts of the interview. In: Der Spiegel , No. 31/1980, pp. 36-49 and No. 33/1980, pp. 30-36
  5. Jan Philipp Reemtsma : Lust for violence. In: Die Zeit , March 8, 2007
  6. Martin Knobbe: The prosecutor and his informant. In: Stern , April 27, 2007
  7. Peter Henkel: Speitel and Hans-Joachim Dellwo renounce the RAF. In: Frankfurter Rundschau , November 18, 1978
  8. Tobias Wunschik: Baader-Meinhof's children. The second generation of the RAF ; Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1997; P. 139f.
    Thomas Wunschik said: "The fact that the statements of the RAF dropouts from the GDR agree on essential points could theoretically be the result of an agreement between the defendants (or their defense lawyers), in which even the Federal Prosecutor's Office tried to win over credible key witnesses. could have participated. In fact, there were such agreements before the interrogations of Volker Speitel, who was arrested in autumn 1977, began. ”In: Baader-Meinhofs Kinder. The second generation of the RAF ; Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1997; P. 150 with reference to note 813: Rolf Gössner: Das Anti-Terror-System. Political justice in the preventive security state ; Terrorists & Judges 2; Hamburg: VSA, 1991; P. 139
  9. ^ Stefan Aust: The Baader-Meinhof-Complex , 1st edition of the new edition, expanded and updated edition. Edition, Hoffmann and Campe, 2017, ISBN 978-3-455-00033-7 , p. 829.
  10. ^ Günter Handlögten, Werner Mathes, Rainer Nübel: The night of Stammheim. In: Stern , October 9, 2002
  11. FOCUS Online: The Mastersinger of the RAF . In: FOCUS Online . ( focus.de [accessed on October 22, 2017]).
  12. Volker Speitel: We wanted everything and nothing at the same time. In: The mirror , Part 1 (no. 31/1980), Part 2 (no. 32/1980), Part 3 (No. 33/1980.) Of reply (No. 37/1980).