Witness Statement Regarding The Shooting Of Wolfgang Grams [1]
“I (…), a resident of Bad Kleinen (...), want to describe the events
surrounding the fatal shooting of Wolfgang Grams and the arrest of
Birgit Hogefeld.
At first, I thought some kids were fooling around. I heard the shots in
the foot-tunnel and I thought they were fireworks. Then there was lots
of
shouting, and I heard a man yell: “Halt, stand still!” At the same
moment,
there were more shots. Then I saw a man lying on the rails on Track 4.
The
man was lying on the rails and not moving. Later I heard it was
Wolfgang
Grams, I thought that Grams was already dead. One agent leaned over and
shot
Grams several times at close range. And that, despite the fact that be
already
looked dead. The agent aimed for the head and fired, from very close
by,
a few centimeters away from Grams’ head. Then a second agent shot at
Grams,
but he aimed at the stomach or legs. That agent also fired several
times.
Than a group of masked men came in and stationed themselves with their
machine
guns by the locomotive of the train in the track nearby, I turned
around
and hid myself. I didn’t want to see anything more, because I was
afraid
that they would discover me. I told all of this to the police in Bad
Kleinen
that same evening in their office. Before that, at around 6 or 7pm, I
was
at the Billard Cafe in the station. There, some agents, who did not
introduce
themselves, nor did they show any identification, showed me some
black-and-white
photos. There were several photos, I don’t remember exactly how many.
But
I know that several of the photos were of a man and a. woman crossing a
street.
I recognized that the photos were taken on a street nearby the station.
The
agent asked if I recognized either of the two people. I said that I
recognized
the woman, and then the agent said that was enough. That made me mad,
because
surely the agent would eventually want to know something from me, I
realized
then that the woman was the woman with blonde hair that I had seen
earlier,
on Sunday, before everything had happened. At that time, she was
wearing
glasses and she made a bit of a strange impression on me. Now I know
that
the agents were at the station for quite some time before the
shoot-out,
Certainly at least the day before, because how else could they have
developed
these photos in time? I have to ask myself, why they didn’t arrest the
man
and the woman then, if they were able to photograph them? When I think
about
what could have happened if the shoot-out had been just half an hour
later,
things would have been terrible. Because shortly before 4pm on a Sunday
afternoon,
there are lots of people in the foot-tunnel, travelers seeking to make
the
important trains that run during that hour. There could have been many
deaths.”
Bad Kleinen, June 30, 1993
Footnotes
N.B. All footnotes in this document were
added by the editor. None are originally from the RAF.
[1] RAF members Birgit Hogefeld and Wolfgang Grams had
been lured to Bad Kleinen by a police informant – Klaus Steinmetz – one
June 27th 1993. While Steinmetz and the two RAF members sat talking at
the train station, 54 officers deployed around the building to close
in as the three departed. Grams managed to get away, but was quickly
captured. The subsequent medical examination showed that the shot that
caused the
fatal wound to Grams head was fired from close range. [return to text]
