In 1966, I was a young military policeman assigned to Erlangen, outside Nuremberg. While there, I heard the story of the so-called "Beast of Bayreuth", a US Army lieutenant, who had been arrested in 1964 for the gruesome murder of his German girlfriend, who he cut up into pieces and strewed along the roads outside Bayreuth, a town not far from Erlangen made famous by the composer Richard Wagner who lived there.
Although I knew that the killer had been captured and prosecuted, his story was forgotten as I left the army and the years passed. A few years ago, I was talking on the phone with an ex-Erlangen GI who asked about the case. He had been Googling "Beast of Bayreuth" but had come up empty. I tried as well but with the same results.
This week, while surfing through a website for veterans of Ferris Barracks (our Erlangen kaserne), a found another query as to whatever became of the "Beast of Bayreuth"? The question was whether he had been executed, was serving life in prison or what?
This time, Google was more accommodating. The actual name of the officer was Gerald Maurice Werner. Now there are a handful (so far) of articles that bring us up to date on his fate.
Upon his arrest after parts of his victim's body were found along the roads, Werner confessed to killing his girlfriend, Ursula Schamel, by choking her and drowning her in the bathtub of his home in Bayreuth. He then cut her in pieces and tried to flush the parts down the toilet before putting them in his car and throwing them along the rural roads outside Bayreuth. Werner was confined at the stockade at Fuerth until it was finally agreed that the Germans would try his case under the Status of Forces Agreement. In German court, he was ruled insane and confined for a few years in a German mental institution (Heil und Phlege Anstalt) in Ansbach. The decision was based on interviews of Werner by psychiatric experts from the University of Erlangen. It naturally caused outrage among members of Schamel's family and the public.
The below English-language article from that time tells the story up to his conviction.
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1955&dat=19670212&id=7eQiAAAAIBAJ&sjid=xJkFAAAAIBAJ&pg=2138,5475773
In 1971, Werner was turned back over to the US Military who returned him to the US and discharged him. But he was not yet a free man. A state court in his home state of Minnesota confined him to a mental hospital. He was declared of sound mind in 1976 and released. Then in 1979, a court awarded him back pay for the period he was under US-German confinement from 1964 to 1971! That information is contained in the comment thread of the below site (Dragoon Base-see Garrett Bruen). The reader who relayed the below facts was a records clerk in the army in Germany during the 1960s and had to send monthly reports on Werner to the Pentagon.
http://dragoonbase.com/group/bindlach/forum/topics/2nd-armored-cavalry
Below is the text of the court decision on the Werner claim for correction of his military records.
http://federal-circuits.vlex.com/vid/gerald-werner-v-the-united-states-38403484
But what happened to Werner after 1979? At last report, he was living in Minnesota. A German source, the Nordbayerische Kurier, recently writing on the story, seems to have found a final answer.
http://www.bt24.de/aktuelles/region/item/86301/gebiet/bayreuth/us_oberleutnant_gerald_m_werner_bringt_seine_freundin_um_und_zerst%FCckelt_die_leiche_8211_er_landet_in_der_psychiatrie_nicht_im_gef%E4ngnis
The final paragraph indicates that an Internet search found a reference to the reported death of a man with the same name and age on April 6, 1999 in (Inver) Grove Heights, Minnesota.
Here is what I have been able to find:
http://www.locategrave.org/l/3050296/Gerald-Maurice-Werner-MN
It seems that the years 1979-1999 are still unknown to the public as to what happened to Werner in his last twenty years.
Bayreuth is a city with a history. It was a margravial home of the Hollenzollern family, and as mentioned, was the home of Richard Wagner and the opera house connected to him and his surviving family. To the city's embarrassment, it was also favored by Adolf Hitler, who, as a Wagner fan, became a friend and patron of the Wagner family. As evidenced by the recent German news article, the city also remembers the "Beast of Bayreuth".
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7 comments:
I was stationed in the 87th dental det at the 20 station hospital in Nurnberg in 1965- I worked in the exam room and they brought Werner in several times- he would be handcuffed to the dental chair and I would take x rays on him- he never said a word to any of us.
Here is a medicalreport that is online regarding Werner. It actually concerns his appeal for back pay. https://www.leagle.com/decision/19811046642f2d4041933
https://www.alamy.com/oct-10-1966-commit-gi-in-german-killing-bayreuth-germany-oct-18-ap-image69425619.html
Donald Persinger Sargent C troop 2nd armor Cav
Bayreuth Germany 1964 On TDY to guard Lt Werner at Nuremberg Stockade
I was attached to the 2nd Armored Cavalry for West Point AOT during the summer of 1963. Lt. Werner was my “sponsor” for training. I knew him and Ursula pretty well, although my memories are vague. I think I went on double dates with them several times; she set me up because I spoke fluent German. I did not notice or remember anything strange about him, he was very helpful to me. I only learned about the incident when the Captain of our unit sent me a letter the following year. I was talking to a classmate recently about Germany and that triggered the memory, and I googled this. That’s about all I can recall until I read all this. pretty scary.
Tommy Thompson
In the early 70’s, I was attached to the 2nd Region CID in Grafenwohr, Germany. Bill Russell was the Agent in Charge and told me to get some old CID files from the attic of the CID office .These were old case files that had been closed out for several years. I brought down several boxes and Bill told me to incinerate them in our local incinerator. I recall that this was one of the files with attached gruesome photos. When I finished burning these files I stopped by the MPI office which was downstairs from our CID office. I recall John McClain was in charge of the MPI and I told him I had just incinerated some old closed out CID files and was telling him about the one with the gruesome body parts strewn along the road. John told me he was very familiar with that case he was on duty back then when the Lt. was brought in and stripped before being placed in the D cell. John told me that he could not understand why someone didn’t notice anything strange about him as he had shaved his arms, legs and pubic hair and that the only place he had any hair was some on his head. I don’t know. If John is still living, but Bill Russell passed away many years ago .others I worked with at the CID office were Tommy Washington, Robert Burns and Henry McIntyre.
Thank you for the comment and information. A fascinating story.
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