page_title: Egon Krenz
section_title: Trial and imprisonment
hierarchical_section_title: Egon Krenz / Trial and imprisonment
caption_attribution_description: Egon Krenz und der BR-Moderator Klaus Kastan
context_page_description: Egon Rudi Ernst Krenz is a former East German politician who was the last communist leader of East Germany during the final months of 1989. He succeeded Erich Honecker as the General Secretary of the ruling Socialist Unity Party of Germany, but was forced to resign only months later when the Berlin Wall fell. He has been described as "East Germany's last dictator."
  Throughout his career, Krenz held a number of prominent positions in the SED. He was Honecker's deputy from 1984 onward, until he succeeded him in 1989 amid protests against the regime. Krenz was unsuccessful in his attempt to retain the communist regime's grip on power, and was forced to resign some weeks after the fall of the Berlin Wall. He was expelled from the SED party on 21 January 1990. After German reunification in 1990, he was sentenced to six-and-a-half years in prison for manslaughter, for his role in the crimes of the communist regime. He retired to the small town of Dierhagen in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern upon his release from prison in late 2003. Since his release from prison he has expressed his support for Vladimir Putin.
context_section_description: In 1997, Krenz was sentenced to six-and-a-half years' imprisonment for Cold War crimes, specifically manslaughter of four Germans attempting to escape East Germany over the Berlin Wall. He was also charged with electoral fraud, along with other criminal offences.
  He appealed, arguing that the legal framework of the newly reunited German state did not apply to events that had taken place in the former GDR. Krenz also argued that the prosecution of former GDR officials was a breach of a personal agreement given by West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl to Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev during their talks, which led to German reunification. However, the verdict was upheld in 1999. Krenz reportedly described his conviction as "victor's justice" and "cold war in court", saying, "The victorious power is avenging itself on the representatives of the defeated power" (Die siegreiche Macht rächt sich an den Vertretern der besiegten Macht).
  Krenz began serving his sentence in Hakenfelde Prison shortly thereafter, before he was transferred to Plötzensee Prison, a prison with stricter rules. Krenz's application to the European Court of Human Rights on alleged misuse of GDR criminal laws reached the Grand Chamber, but was rejected in 2001.
  He was released from prison in December 2003 after serving nearly four years of his sentence, and quietly retired with his wife Erika (11 November 1939 – 4 March 2017) to Dierhagen in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. He remained on parole until the end of his sentence in 2006.
caption: Egon Krenz in 2013
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