Werner Gladow

Werner Gladow (* 8. May 1931 in Berlin , † 10. November 1950 in Frankfurt (Oder) ), the young chief who was Gladow gang in Berlin of the postwar period . He was executed in 1950 as one of the first citizens in the GDR . He was convicted of murder , attempted murder and robbery .

Life

Werner Gladow, son of a butcher from Berlin-Friedrichshain , initially worked as a black marketeer on Alexanderplatz at the age of 16 shortly after the end of the Second World War .

White tie gang

While serving a youth sentence, he met Werner Papke , with whom he initially relieved officials of the People's Police from their weapons in 21 cases at the sector border . Shortly afterwards, Gladow gathered a group of young people around him and began minor thefts. He was called a doctorate by his cronies because he had completed the tertia of a Berlin high school and claimed to have studied medicine for a few semesters. Inspired by books, movies and detective novels, he dreamed of a life in the style of Al Capone , rich and feared by his opponents. He later approached his role model in fashion by wearing black made-to-measure suits, made-to-measure shoes and white ties. The "white ties" were the identification marks of the gang, which was so called by the press.

He, on the committed robberies in the West part of the city and then fled into the eastern part of sector boundary the pursuing him in West Berlin police had to stop the persecution. The next time he carried out a robbery in the east part of the city and fled to a rented apartment or to a rubble plot in the west. During these border crossings, the fact that the East and West Police hardly worked together was used. This activity was initially followed with sympathy by some adults and the press in the early days of the Cold War . Gladow then began staging his robberies for the media and left “business cards” at the crime scene. The gang grew from ten to 27 members at times and procured weapons, for example during an attack on a people's police patrol . In doing so, she denied bank robberies, in which the first seriously injured and two deaths were to be mourned, which ultimately led to a change in mood in the greater Berlin population.

Arrest, trial and execution

At the age of 18, Werner Gladow was betrayed by his wife Gustav Völpels , a captured gang member. Placed by officials in his parents' apartment on Schreinerstraße in Friedrichshain, Gladow was arrested after an hour-long gun battle with the People's Police. His mother warned him loudly by shouting “Detective pigs!” Before the intruding officers, and Gladow, in turn, shot the police officers with a pistol in both hands. His mother helped him reload the pistols and direct the shots. Gladow could only be overwhelmed after he was incapacitated by a leg shot.

In a sensational trial Werner Gladow was with two other band members in 1950 sentenced to death and one of the first citizens on the territory of the GDR in Frankfurt (Oder) executed . The lawyer of one of the co-defendants later summed up “The trial at that time was not a show trial. It was a trial strictly according to the procedural rules, but [...] hard. ”Before him, on July 26, 1950, Willi Kimmritz was executed. Allegedly pinched first the guillotine and stayed twice in the neck of screaming in pain 19-year-old stuck. The third attempt was ultimately successful. The prosecutor reportedly passed out during the execution process.

Trivia

In connection with the pronouncement of his verdict, Gladow is ascribed the following sentence: "You know, Mr. Judge, the triple death penalty, once I'll let myself go, cut the pear off, but the other time I would say this is desecration."

Film and documentaries

Gladow's life has been filmed several times, including by the poet-director Thomas Brasch in the feature film Engel aus Eisen ( Federal Republic of Germany , 1980, played by Ulrich Wesselmann ). The film paints a realistic picture of the then rubble Berlin. Especially the dark West Berlin due to the lack of electricity at the time of the Berlin Airlift meant an ideal place for the Gladow gang for raids. The film is underlaid with the constant hum of the raisin bombers lying over the city , which landed every three minutes, were unloaded and then climbed up again to bring in new relief supplies.

In 2000, the SFB produced the fifth episode of the documentary series “The Great Criminal Cases” directed by Ute Bönnen and Gerald Endres, the contribution “The Gladow Gang. Chicago in Berlin ”.

Gladow and the crimes of his gang were the subject of the 2015 docudrama "Werner G. - The head of the Gladow gang" from the RBB series Tatort Berlin (authors: Gabi Schlag and Benno Wenz).

literature

• Wolfgang Mittmann : Gladow gang: The gunslingers of Berlin (=  large cases of the people's police . Volume 5 ). Das Neue Berlin, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-360-01228-3 .
• Peter Niggl, Hari Winz: Death in Berlin. Criminal cases from the metropolis. 2nd revised edition. Das Neue Berlin, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-360-00789-1 .
• Bernd Oertwig : Big City Wolves . Gladow's gang - the horror of Berlin (= Ullstein book 20152). Ullstein publishing house, Frankfurt am Main et al. 1981, ISBN 3-548-20152-0 .
• Gerald Endres : The Gladow Gang - Chicago in Berlin. In: Helfried Spitra (ed.): The great criminal cases . Germany in the mirror of famous crimes (= Piper 3806). Piper Verlag GmbH, Munich et al. 2003, ISBN 3-492-23806-8 , pp. 11-35.

See also

• List of people executed in the GDR

Web links

• Fire under merchants' feet . In: Der Spiegel . No. 14 , 1950 ( online ).
• Ute Bönnen and Gerald Endres : The Gladow Gang - Chicago in Berlin , Das Erste from June 22, 2000

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Tatjana Kerschbaumer: RBB film about the Gladow gang: Little Chicago on the Spree. In: Tagesspiegel.de. November 8, 2015, accessed August 9, 2020 . 
2. ^ "Tatort Berlin" of the RBB. The Gladow gang shoots again . In: Der Tagesspiegel . June 15, 2015 ( tagesspiegel.de [accessed July 7, 2019]).
3. ↑ From the butcher's son to the gang boss . In: Deutschlandfunk . April 8, 2005 ( deutschlandfunk.de [accessed July 7, 2019]).
4. ↑ ^{a b c} Rüdiger Strempel: Berlin post-war gang leader Werner Gladow: The murderer with the milk face . In: Der Spiegel . May 16, 2019 ( spiegel.de [accessed on July 7, 2019] Gladow's father's occupation incorrectly stated as a police officer ).
5. ↑ Der Spiegel : Death penalty in the GDR: Erich Mielke's very short trials. Peter Maxwill, July 17, 2012, accessed July 17, 2012.
6. ↑ http://www.deutschlandfunkkultur.de/vom-metzgersoh-zum-gangsterboss.932.de.html?dram:article_id=128939
7. ^ BZ : Our city: Gladow gang executed. Executioner in custody. September 25, 2002.
8. ↑ http://www.dradio.de/dkultur/sendung/kalenderblatt/363740/
9. ↑ "The Gladow Gang": Tonight in the First: an exciting chapter in Berlin's criminal history . Der Tagesspiegel , June 21, 2000, accessed June 9, 2012.