Grebeníček’s shoes

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Jan Janků was arrested in May 1949 and involved in a trial with the anti-communist resistance group “Světlana." He awaited trial in custody in Uherské Hradiště. At that time, Alois Grebeníček and Antonín Višenka, who gained notoriety for their brutality, worked as investigators at this penal facility in Uherské Hradiště. The interrogations were accompanied by massive beatings, torture, and the abuse of psychotropic substances. Right at the beginning of his internment, Jan Janků witnessed the death of two members of the Světlana resistance group, who had previously been brutally tortured. Jan recalls the beginnings of Grebeníček’s era in the Uherské Hradiště prison, in particular a sadistic method of investigation used by Alois Grebeníček, that the inmates nicknamed “Grebeníček’s shoes.” It was a special shoe that was wired and the inmate wearing the shoe was subjected to torture by electric shocks. Jan Janků recalls: “One prisoner once managed to rip out the metal strip that was embedded in the shoe. Grebeníček said ‘we do have a remedy for this’. He duct-taped the strip to the shoe so that it became impossible to rip it out again.”

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Radomír Silber
2019-02-11 09:01:23: Tvrzení Jana Janků, že elektrické zařízení k mučení vězňů inicioval a používal A. Grebeníček neodpovídá skutečnosti. Dle spolehlivých pramenů, které má k dispozici také ÚSTR, inicioval vznik, výrobu a použití tohoto zařízení velitel L. Hlavačka, který ukládal a umožňoval používání tohoto zařízení při výsleších vězňů úzké skupině "svých" lidí. Mezi ně A. Grebeníček, který s ním byl ve sporu, nepatřil. J. Janků nebyl v takzvaném vsetínském procesu odsouzen na doživotí, ale přímo na 20 let odnětí svobody. Podle Ústavem pro studium totalitních režimů publikovaného životopisu Jana janků je tvrzení Jana Janků o tom, že by Jana Janků vyslýchal A. Grebeníček mylné. Neodpovídá ani skutečnosti tvrzení Jana Janků, že by byl svědkem ubití A. Pohůnka a ani tvrzení, že by přišel do cely po A. Pohůnkovi těsně poté co A. Pohůnek zemřel. ÚSTR publikoval na https://www.ustrcr.cz/uvod/vzdelavaci-projekt-pamet-a-dejiny-totalitnich-rezimu/pametnici-protikomunistickeho-odboje-a-odporu/jan-janku/ informaci, že Jan Janků A. Grebeníčka "však osobně nezažil".

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Jan Janků

Jan Janků was born in 1921 in Hanušovice in the district of Šumperk. Around the year 1936, he was introduced to the Scout movement. He became an active member and is still actively engaged in the Scout today. After the annexation of the Sudetenland in 1939, the family of Jan Janků was forcibly moved to Vrbatky nearby Přerov. In Vrbatky, Jan graduated from a business academy and was later employed in a candy factory. In early 1941, he was assigned to forced labor in Wroclaw. In 1943, he fled and came back to the Protectorate. In 1944, he went to France, where he served as a driver of the UNRRA. After returning to Czechoslovakia, he became actively involved in the Scout movement and became a scout troop leader. In May 1949, he was arrested in connection with the clampdown on the resistance group Světlana. He spent over a year in pre-trial detention in Uherské Hradište, where he was brutally “interrogated,” among others by Alois Grebeníček. He was at first sentenced to life imprisonment in a show trial that followed his detention. Afterwards, the sentence was changed to 20 years. He served most of his term in the Mírov prison, where he would later work as a pharmacist. Jan is a deeply religious man and he led a spiritual throughout his term in Mírov prison. In 1958, he was released. After his release, he worked as a railway man. Since 1989, he has been actively involved in commemorating the fate of the political prisoners of the 1950s, participating in lectures and discussions. He owns an extensive archive documenting the crimes of the Communist regime.

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Uherské Hradiště, prison

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During the 1950s, the prison in Uherské Hradiště became the place of suffering for hundreds of people who were either politically opposed to, or simply inconvenient to the newly established communist regime. Arrestees were brought to the prison, which stood adjoining the Regional Court; there they were harassed and interrogated. The prison section of the building has been deserted for several decades.