Czechoslovak Political Prisoners - über das Projekt Political ...

do with that case could not be present in that hall. Whether it was associate lawyers or the
master of the court, we saw just one person that I remember really well. It was the communist
editor, Václav Švadlena who was writing for the newspaper “Rudé právo” 10 . He was the only
one who had free access to this whole process.
What was your perception of the whole court process?
We thought it would be easy and we would be acquitted of those charges. When we saw
that the head judge started dealing with our charges we still thought we would get some leniency.
The second day Bóža Modrý and I were sitting there the whole day and the others were
testifying, Roziňák, Konopásek, Macelis, Jirka, Štock, Španninger, and the pub owner Ujčík,
who got three years for not stopping us from the disturbance. When we were waiting for the
final sentence, we were all standing.
What were the final verdicts?
We heard the speech of the judge as we were all acquitted from the death penalty, but we
were each given sentences: Modrý 15 years, I 14 years, Konopásek 12 years, Roziňák and Kobranov
both 10 years, then it was 6 years for Jirka I think, 3 years for Červený, 2 for Macelis,
Hajný got a year, and Španninger got 9 months 11 . The pub owner Ujčík got three years. All of
a sudden we were standing there completely depressed because we were standing up against
something that couldn’t be recalled. Of course after we consulted with our lawyers the five of
us who were given the harshest sentences for high treason and spying immediately appealed
to the highest court. The five of us who had 15, 14, 12, and 10 years appealed to the highest
court 12 . We were put back into our cells and I remember such a funny story. When I came back
to the cell, two of my cellmates were already both sentenced. One of them had twenty years
and the other had maybe eighteen years, so we came and they said, “So how much did you
get?” and I said, “fourteen.” “Man that’s nothing, you’ll sit that on a razor blade,” they said.
I answered, “What? On a razor blade? Fourteen years on a razor blade, that’s not possible.”
They said, “that’s how it’s said here, when a person isn’t hung-up, and he can walk away from
the sentence and go on living.”
What happened next after the court verdict?
We were waiting for a long time in the court department and sometime in November they
chased us out and loaded us on a bus. The whole escort was maybe around thirty people.
We were together and I remember I was tied up to the arm of big Červený, our goalie. They
put us on the bus. The bus was surrounded by police cars. We were leaving and we didn’t
know where we were going whether it was a prison or a camp. From our cellmates we were
informed that you can either go to another prison or a camp. All of a sudden we appeared
at the prison Bory 13 . When we came there it was just terrible. The welcome process when we
were walking in the corridors to the main square … I think it was “B” … a big circus started.
There was a guard who started yelling at us and calling us names. Some prisoners were even
making fun of it and also Červený was making fun of it, he was quite a joker. There they hit
10 Rudé právo – (in English “Red right”) before 1989 daily newspaper of the Communist Party.
11 The New York Times published an article about the trial on the front page on 10 October 1950. The western world was
partly informed about such events.
12 Highest court stands for the court organ, which has different functions in countries – in general it is an organ that has
the last decision and against which there is not another appeal allowed.
13 The prison Plzeň – Bory is situated in the western part of Bohemia, during the communist era it was one of the strictest
prisons, where mainly political prisoners were placed.
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