After the Nazis seized power in Germany, Heinrich Reiser (1899–1978) became an official of the secret police (Gestapo), and participated in the occupation of the Czech hinterland in March 1939. In the summer of 1940 he was ordered to France, where he specialised in the suppression of the left-wing resistance and the Soviet espionage network that came to be known as the Red Orchestra (Rote Kapelle). At the end of the war, he took part in the repressions against the foreign workers under forced labour in Germany. When the war ended, he spent some time in hiding and was briefly imprisoned by the French army. After the war alliance between the victorious powers broke up, Reiser’s knowledge and abilities were used by the Gehlen Organisation, on the foundations of which the West German security service (BND) was later established. As part of the denazification process in the security services in the late 1950s, agents with a Nazi past were fired, or sent into retirement, which was also the case with Reiser. The justice of the Federal Republic of Germany was only ever interested in him as a witness in investigating other members of the Nazi repressive apparatus, and he was never punished for his crimes.

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