# Willi Block (1934–1966)

> Willi Block, a 31-year-old former border policeman from Berlin, became entangled in barbed wire while trying to escape near the Staaken border crossing on 7 February 1966 and was shot by East German border guards as West Berlin police looked on.

- Born: 5 June 1934
- Died: 7 February 1966
- Age at death: 31
- Cause of death: Shot
- Circumstances: Died trying to escape
- Place and circumstances as recorded: Near the Staaken border crossing; On the outer ring between Staaken (Nauen district) and Berlin-Spandau
- Map position (approximate): 52.52414, 13.14334
- Area: outer ring between West Berlin and the GDR
- Web page: https://victimsofthewall.com/victims/block-willi/

## Story

Willi Block was born in Berlin on 5 June 1934. He trained as a construction worker and from 1954 to 1959 served in the East German border police, where he became a tank commander and finally an instructor in Wismar, leaving with the rank of Feldwebel (sergeant) and as a member of the SED, the ruling party. As a member of a workers' militia, he took part in building the Wall in 1961.

He fled to West Berlin for the first time on 13 January 1962, then went back a month later to fetch his wife and was arrested. He was sent to a re-training and labour camp and released after six weeks, partly because his evidently influential father intervened, and while there agreed to inform for the Stasi under the cover name "Rabe", though he evidently declined concrete spying assignments. On 18 August 1962 he fled west again and told the authorities about his recruitment, after which proceedings were opened against him at the West Berlin superior court for violating the freedom protection law.

In December 1962, learning that his wife wanted a divorce, he returned to the East once more. This time he was treated as a traitor, accused of spying for western intelligence, and in April 1963 sentenced to five years, which he served in Bautzen. A British intelligence note suggests he had cooperated with a Western intelligence agency, and British officers had no doubt that he was a double agent. Released early in November 1965, he was assigned a job at the Staaken concrete plant near the border, where he often clashed with his supervisors.

On 7 February 1966 he drank so much during his shift that he was not allowed to carry on working; a colleague last saw him asleep on a cot in the lounge at around 3 p.m. Soon afterwards he must have decided to flee once more; unnoticed and in broad daylight, he got past the inner fence and a dog run near the crossing to Spandau. At around 3:45 p.m. two guards on a watchtower spotted him; they fired a flare and a barrage, and shots struck the ground in front of him. He tried to crawl under the three coils of barbed wire between him and West Berlin, but his clothes caught in the second coil and he was held fast, lying on his stomach.

West Berlin customs officers and police arrived, soon followed by an ambulance, and tried to make contact with him. He called out that he was unhurt, gave the name of his brother, who lived in West Berlin, and asked them to pass on his regards. Guards on the eastern side, joined by their regiment commander, surrounded him; when an officer called on him to come back, he answered that he could not. For a few minutes nothing happened. Then, as he tried once more to pull himself towards the West, a number of guards opened fire, among them the regiment commander, who emptied his pistol and then fired a Kalashnikov from 15 metres. Seventy-two shots were fired; four hit him, three of them fatal.

His body had to be cut free from the wire. Two border soldiers on their way to their barracks glimpsed it on a truck and decided on the spot to flee, unwilling to find themselves having to shoot at an escapee; they reached West Berlin together that same evening. Three days later a Potsdam prosecutor told his father that his son had died in an accident during an attempt to break through the border for which he himself was to blame, made him sign an undertaking to keep the circumstances secret, and required an urn burial at Baumschulenweg Cemetery.

In 1993 four former officers and guards were charged with attempted manslaughter. The chief of staff and both guards were acquitted by the Berlin Regional Court in January 1995 because it could not be proved that they had aimed at him or acted together with the one who fired the fatal shots. In the separate proceedings against the regiment commander it could not be established who had fired the fatal shots, although it was considered highly probable that he had. He was first convicted of attempted manslaughter; after the prosecution appealed and the Federal Court of Justice ruled, he was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to three years in prison, not suspended; the Berlin Regional Court said his conduct at the scene bore the character of an (attempted) execution.

## Sources

1. Martin Ahrends/Udo Baron/Hans-Hermann Hertle, “Willi Block”, biography in Chronik der Mauer, Federal Agency for Civic Education, Centre for Contemporary History Potsdam and Deutschlandradio. Accessed 23 September 2026. https://www.chronik-der-mauer.de/en/victims/180540/block-willi
2. German version of the same biography. Accessed 23 September 2026. https://www.chronik-der-mauer.de/todesopfer/171376/block-willi
3. Hans-Hermann Hertle and Maria Nooke (eds.), The Victims at the Berlin Wall, 1961–1989: A Biographical Handbook. Centre for Contemporary History Potsdam and Berlin Wall Foundation, Berlin 2011.
4. Hans-Hermann Hertle and Maria Nooke, “140 Victims at the Berlin Wall, 1961–1989” (list), Centre for Contemporary History Potsdam and Berlin Wall Foundation, August 2017. https://www.chronik-der-mauer.de/system/files/dokument_pdf/2017_08_08_140%20Victims_at_the_Wall_List_Internet_engl_FINAL.pdf
5. Hans-Hermann Hertle and Maria Nooke, “The Victims at the Berlin Wall, 1961–1989: Findings of a Research Project”, August 2017. https://www.chronik-der-mauer.de/system/files/dokument_pdf/2017_08_08_Hertle_Nooke_140_Victims_Berlin_Wall_FINAL_0.pdf

This profile is a summary written for this site; every fact in it is taken from source 1.

Cite as: “Willi Block”, Victims of the Berlin Wall, Berlin Experiences. https://victimsofthewall.com/victims/block-willi/