WEST BERLIN: POLICE AND DEMONSTRATORS BATTLE IN MAIN STREET OVER DEATH OF ANARCHIST IN PRISON.
Record ID:
1063782
WEST BERLIN: POLICE AND DEMONSTRATORS BATTLE IN MAIN STREET OVER DEATH OF ANARCHIST IN PRISON.
- Title: WEST BERLIN: POLICE AND DEMONSTRATORS BATTLE IN MAIN STREET OVER DEATH OF ANARCHIST IN PRISON.
- Date: 12th November 1974
- Summary: ALL NIGHT SHOTS 1. SV PAN FROM Police TO window of house 0.08 2. SV & CU Nameplate on house (2 shots) 0.14 3. SV Berlin University Clinic sign 0.16 4. GSV's EXTERIOR Clinic 0.29 5. CU & GV PAN Police vehicles and police in street (3 shots) 0.40 6. SV PAN Demonstrators carry banner along street (2 shots) 0.54 7. SV & GV Police moving forward (2 shots) 1.01 8. GV Demonstrators running 1.04 9. GV's & SV's Police with riot shields attack with tear gas (5 shots) 1.23 10. SV Man being dragged away by police 1.26 11. GV Demonstrators fighting with police 1.30 12. GV Water cannon sprays crowd as it drives down street (3 shots) 1.41 13. CU & SV Damaged car windscreen and shop fronts and windows (5 shots) 1.57 Initials BB/2205 WK/PN/BB/2220 Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
- Embargoed: 26th November 1974 12:00
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- Location: WEST BERLIN
- Country: Germany
- Reuters ID: LVA1WX5KWX17QQ35G1WWZD8B0Y27
- Story Text:The death of an anarchist in a West German prison last Saturday (9 Nov.) seems to have provoked the murder of Herr Guenter von Drenkmann, President of the West Berlin Supreme Court, and ??? a series of running street battles between the police and huge crowds of demonstrators accusing the authorities of "planned and calculated murder".
Holger Mains, a member of the Baader-Meinhof group of anarchists, died last Saturday in Wittlich prison after a two month-long hunger strike. Though he was six feet (1.85 metres) tall, he weighed only about six stone ten pounds (42 kilogrammes) when he died.
The latest incident occurred on Monday (11 November) when police used batons, tear gas and water cannon to scatter a crowd of five thousand demonstrators in a fashionable street of West Berlin. The demonstrators fought back with paving stones and looted shops before dispersing. Twenty six policemen and twenty nine demonstrators were injured in the clashes.
SYNOPSIS: The home of West Berlin's Chief Judge, Herr Guenter von Drenkmann, who was shot dead on Sunday night. The Judge was shot twice through the heart as his wife struggled with two gunmen.
The Judge was already dead when he was taken to West Berlin's University Clinic. Police believe his murder was an act of revenge for the death on Saturday of a member of an anarchist group in prison.
The man who died in prison, 33-year-old Holger Meins, weighed only forty two kilogrammes after a two month-long hunger strike. The authorities attribute his death to heart failure but his supporters claim that it was "planned and calculated murder by instalments". Since his death a series of protest demonstrations have rocked West Berlin.
The demonstrations were so violent that West German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt on Monday promised the nation to combat "terror and violence".
It was precisely that very night that the biggest clash between demonstrators and police occurred. Some five thousand demonstrators were marching down a fashionable shopping boulevard when they were stopped by the police. When the demonstrators refused to disperse, the police threw tear gas canisters and fighting broke out.
The police drew their batons and charged, backed up by high-powered jets from mobile water cannon which forced the young demonstrators down the street.
The demonstrators fought back with paving stones, and smashed car and shop windows along the street before dispersing. West Berliners now fear that there will he more demonstrations like this one in which fifty-five policemen and demonstrators were injured. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS - SOURCE TO BE VERIFIED
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