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Love this podcast? Support this show through the Acast supporter feature. It's up to you how much you give, and there's no regular commitment. Just click the link in the show description to support now. Welcome to the Serial Killer Podcast. The podcast dedicated to serial killers. Who they were, what they did, and how. I am your host,
Thomas Weyborg Thun, and imagine, if you will, dear listener, Germany in the 1920s. While the Allies of the West had had a decade of decadence and consumerism following their victory in World War I, Germany was left poor, desolate, and hungry. Unemployment is rampant.
Hungry young men are struggling everywhere to find work in order to simply feed themselves and their families, and inflation is rapidly increasing. In this depressive setting, a young man named Adolf Hennepel, of only 17 years old, is sitting in the freezing waiting room at Hanover's train station. He is sitting on a hard wooden bench, and despite the gloomy atmosphere, he is in a surprisingly good mood.
Most men his age are unemployed, but he has managed to secure an apprenticeship and is looking forward to once more sleeping in a warm bed with a full stomach. Unknown to young Adolf, a stocky man of about forty years of age is watching him from across the room. The man approaches, according to later witnesses, and the teenager and him start a friendly conversation.
A few minutes later, they leave the train station, and no one ever sees young Adolf Hennepel again. What is known is that he suffered the same fate as at least twenty-seven other young boys and men between September of 1918 and June of 1924. The youngest victim was a boy of only ten years old, the oldest no more than twenty-two.
They are beaten or coerced into submission, sexually assaulted, suffered bites to the throat and murdered, before being cut into pieces and often eaten by the same man. The killer has, as so many other serial killers before and after, many nicknames, but most recognize him as the Vampire of Hanover. His name was Friedrich Fritz Arman.
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Friedrich Heinrich Karl Harman was born the youngest of six children on October 25th, 1879. His mother, 41 at the time of his birth, spoiled and pampered him as a child and encouraged young Fritz to play with dolls instead of more masculine games. Most crucial to the interests of a psychologist, Fritz disliked his father and
from a very early age and was to continue this loathing throughout his life the parents were indeed an ill-assorted couple old harmon was a morose and cantankerous locomotive stoker who was to be found at night rampaging his way around the seedy bars of the old town
His wife, Johanna Claudius, was seven years his senior, and provided him with a dowry of several houses and a small fortune, making him a wealthy citizen in this time of rapid economic expansion. Johanna was a simple-minded, slightly stupid woman, and managed to ignore her husband's continuous drunkenness and womanizing.
The birth of her sixth child left her sick, and she spent much of her remaining twelve years in bed. As for Harman's siblings, the eldest son, Alfred, became a lower-middle-class factory foreman with upright family values.
The second son, Wilhelm, was sentenced at an early age for sexual offence, and the three sisters, all of whom divorced their husbands early in married life, proved to be particularly obsessive and compulsive characters. As a child, Fritz was at the mercy of his elder brothers, particularly Wilhelm.
It is believed that he was repeatedly the victim of sexual abuse by him, probably contributing to his sexual disorders in later life. From a young age, Harman and his father argued and constantly threatened each other. Old Harman hated his youngest son, not only because he acted very feminine, but because he stole almost all of his wife's attention from him.
The father threatened to have his son put in an asylum, and Fritz, in turn, tried to have his father thrown in jail for the supposed murder of a train driver. The only occasions of unity were exhibited when the men would combine to either carry out a swindle or to appear in court to exonerate the other. In contrast...
Harman always felt a deep bond with his mother, and she remained the only person he spoke of with warmth and sentimentality. The anecdotes relating to Harman's childhood show two distinct traits. The first is the notable feminine, possibly transvestite tendencies that were exhibited throughout his school life. The second is the pleasure in causing fear and horror.
Harman enjoyed tying up his sisters and regularly tapped on windows in the dead of night, awakening a dormant fear of ghosts and werewolves. The child was spoilt and easily led, yet lively and popular among his peers. So this is an example of a serial killer that was not bullied growing up, unlike many others of his contemporaries and later colleagues.
The boy failed his locksmith apprenticeship, and so was sent to training school for non-commissioned officers at Neubreischach in April of 1895. Fritz was a good gymnast and an obedient soldier, but soon began suffering from periodic lapses in consciousness and epileptic fits. This was blamed on a concussion contracted whilst performing bar exercises or sunstroke suffered during the exercise.
"'Harmon dismissed himself from the sick-bay in November 1895, "'saying that he didn't like it there any more, "'and soon began working for his father.'
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But it's good to have some things that are non-negotiable. For some, that could be a night out with the boys, chugging bears and having a laugh. For others, it might be an eating night. For me, one non-negotiable activity is researching psychopathic serial killers and making this podcast. Even when we know what makes us happy, it's often near impossible to make time for it.
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Sexual offences against children occurred almost every day, and it was not long before the molestation accusations began mounting. Eventually and inevitably, he was deemed incurably deranged by the town doctor and was sent to an asylum shortly after his 18th birthday. It was here that a young man suffered some form of trauma,
It was to affect him for the rest of his life, and his intense fear of the asylum caused him later to say, Hang me, do anything you like to me, but don't take me back to the loony bin. Lackluster security soon allowed the patient to escape, however, and Harman fled to Switzerland.
At the age of just twenty, he returned to Hanover, and around 1900 achieved a sexually normal period when he seduced and married a large pretty girl by the name of Erna Lowert. The engagement had the blessings of both sets of parents, who fervently hoped that the union would put an end to the young delinquent's reckless abandon.
This was not the case, though, as Harman soon deserted the girl and the run-down child for military service. He settled well into army life and, like the killer William Burke before him, became an excellent soldier, full of obedience and espir de corps. Harman was later to refer to his time there as the happiest of his life.
A year went past with no incidents until, in October 1901, Harmon collapsed during a company exercise and was admitted to the military hospital for four months. It was diagnosed that the soldier had a mental deficiency and was deemed unsuitable for use in community service. Once again, Fritz was sent back to his quarrelsome family and resumed his lifelong battle with his father.
Old Harman attempted to have him committed to an asylum, but the town doctor regarded him as merely morally inferior. And, at the ripe old age of twenty-four, Fritz Harman was released into society.
Numerous burglaries and confidence scams soon became a feature of Harmon's life, and after 1904 he spent one-third of the following twenty years either in custody or in prison. In 1914 he was sentenced to five years in jail for theft from a warehouse.
Released in 1918, he joined a smuggling ring and conducted a prosperous business as a smuggler, thief, and police spy. The latter activity guaranteed that his activities were not too closely scrutinized. For a man supposedly struggling with sanity, Armand showed impressive signs of preparation and calculation in his crimes.
The sexual offences also continued, although he was rarely convicted of such misdemeanours as the partners were too ashamed to report him to the police. Upon release from prison in April of 1918, Harmon surfaced briefly in Berlin and then again in Hanover. The murders soon began.
Hans Granz was a very handsome young man who, after the end of World War I, sold sexual favors to survive. Fritz noticed him while strolling along Hanover's red-light district, and soon a bond developed between the two. Granz began living with a now middle-aged man, where a bond of, and I quote, "...madness and spiritual parasitism developed."
Their relationship was more than sexual, and the insane ideas that surfaced in Harmon's conscience always involved his young housemate. During his murderous reign, Harmon lived at the top-floor studio apartment in Hanover. It was a very small, basically attic room. At the bottom floor of the building there was a small restaurant where Harmon and Granz sometimes dined.
Briefly before Harmon met Granz, he had committed his first murder in September of 1918. A young runaway by the name of Friedel Roth disappeared from home on the 25th, writing to his mother only to say he would not return home until, and I quote, she was nice again. Various friends of the boy were forthcoming with information and eventually led the police to No. 27 Sellerstrasse,
The home of a man they claimed had seduced Friedel. A detective surprised one Fritz Harman in bed with a young boy, and he was sentenced to nine months' imprisonment for seducing the juvenile. Unbelievably, the rooms were not searched, and, upon interrogation five years later, Harman confessed that...
and I quote again, the murdered boy's head was stuffed behind the stove wrapped in newspaper. Having carefully avoided his jail sentence throughout 1919, Harmon served his penance from March until December of 1920. Granz thieved his way around Germany during this time, and upon reunion, at Christmas 1920,
the fall of the period of uninterrupted bliss until august of nineteen twenty one the two thieves appeared as well-dressed decent gentlemen and earned respect amongst the local people
Needless to say, however, the two men had more illicit intentions and plied their trade by begging or stealing laundry and selling it back to the public. In early 1922, the two men had moved in to the heart of the so-called haunted area in the city. Arman was earning a good income, the thieving was accompanied by social security payments,
as he had been declared an invalid and therefore unable to work, and also his newfound role as a police informer. Harman double-crossed everybody and became a custodian of the law and an information officer for all criminal matters. Amazingly, the clothes that Harman passed around Hanover earned him the reputation as a benefactor of the homeless population.
His obvious homosexuality further hushed up any theories people may have had as to the origin of the garments. This was probably just as well for him as, in February of 1923, Harmon returned to his murderous past. The killer detained two youths at Hanover Station on the pretense that he was an officer inspecting the waiting rooms.
The less attractive lad was sent away, and Fritz Franke accompanied the phony officer home. Harmon later claimed that Granz had turned up unexpectedly whilst the corpse of Franke was still in the room. Shocked, he simply stared at Harmon and said, ''When shall I come back again?''
Hanover in the 1920s was full of easy victims. Homeless, poor, and desperate people are easy to lure. One such victim was Richard Graf, who disappeared in September of 1923 at the mere age of 17. A meeting with Harmon proves fatal for the young man, who dearly wants to go to America, where his mother has traveled with her new husband.
Richard's father is also gone. He has fled when he could no longer support his five children. Richard's first attempt to reach America fails completely. Fourteen days later, he returns home to his siblings. He is starved, exhausted, and his suitcase has been stolen. But Richard says that he has met a nice man at Hanover railway station who has promised to find him a job. He then returns to Hanover.
Police later find his brown suit among the evidence for Harmon's case. The murders now gained pace, and in the following nine months, twelve more young men's and boys' lives were taken. In almost every scenario, the victim was met at the train station and offered accommodation or work, or apprehended on the pretense that his abductor was a police officer.
The guise was used so often that on one occasion, after a youth welfare worker had asked the guard as to whether Harmon was employed in the same capacity, the station official replied, ''No, he is a detective. Once in the Neustrasse room, the boy would be killed, according to Harmon, by biting through his windpipe.''
Always with a view to his commercial instincts, the boy would then be dismembered, and the clothes and meat sold through the usual channels for smuggled goods. The useless portions were thrown into the river liner. One year later, when the items confiscated from the killer were on public display, victims' families discovered a wealth of personal artifacts.
Many kept as souvenirs, and the remainder sold on through Harmon's impressive distribution network. On each occasion there was normally an array of witnesses who had seen their recognizable Harmon, and often Granz, approach and leave with the stranger. Such was the respect that the two men had now earned for themselves, however, that no incident was ever reported.
On one such circumstance, Harman even had the audacity to reply to an announcement in the paper offering a reward for information. He appeared at the family door and under the guise of a criminologist, yet he was said to have spent most of his time there laughing hysterically. The murders continued unabated throughout early 1924.
Harman honing his remarkable knack of spotting disillusioned young tearaways at the station and then removing them casually into the night. Due to the nature of the victims, angry or estranged parents and friends often took a while to even report disappearance. By then, the clothing and meat of the victims had been speedily distributed around Hanover and were practically untraceable.
Without that sort of hard evidence, the police were at a virtual dead end. Although there were some particularly close calls. On one such occasion, a portion of the trader's meat was taken to the police because the buyer thought it was human flesh. However, it was determined by a so-called expert at the police station that it was only pork meat.
the disappearance of erich de vries on fourteenth of june nineteen twenty four signalled the end of the killer's reign in classic fashion it was an offer of cigarettes at hanover station that tempted the young lad to join the friendly stranger in his room
it was estimated at this time that the fugitive had murdered around twenty-seven boys and young men in less than sixteen months an average of almost two each month and so it was on the seventeenth of may nineteen twenty four
Some children playing at the edge of a river near the Harenhausen Castle found a human skull and, on May the 29th, another washed up on the riverbank. The town was sent in and a frenzy occurred on the 13th of June when two more skulls were found included in the river's sediment. An autopsy proved the first two crania to be that of young people aged between 18 and 20.
and the last skull found from a boy of approximately twelve. In all cases, a sharp instrument had been used to separate the skulls from the torso, and the flesh had been entirely removed. It was initially thought that the human remains originated from the anatomical institute in Gottingen, or that they had been flung into the river by grave robbers, fleeing from capture.
Yet these theories remained unproven, and the mystery gained further publicity when the boys playing on a marshland unearthed a sack containing human bones. It had become impossible for the authorities to keep these grisly finds a secret, and, whilst young boys continued to be reported missing, the number in 1923 grew to almost six hundred.
The Hanoverian population was gripped by terror. The investigation highlighted that those missing were mostly aged between 14 and 18, and rumors were circulating that human flesh had been on sale at the public market. On Whitsunday in 1924, hundreds of people left Hanover and descended on the small paths and bridges of the old town.
where they started searching for human remains. The vastness of this expedition was unprecedented in German criminal history and was spurred on primarily by the talk of a werewolf or a man-eater at large. After a multitude of bones had been discovered, the city's central river liner was dammed and inspected by policemen and municipal workers. The finds were horrific.
More than 500 parts of corpses were detected, proved later to be the remains of at least 22 people, a third aged between 15 and 20. Approximately one half had been in the water for some time, and the joints of many of the fresh bones had smoothly cut surfaces.
Despite the enormous manhunt now in operation, the killer had still not been apprehended, and Hanover was at the point of a public outcry. By late June of 1924, sheer terror had gripped the city, and the werewolf, or vampire, was still on the loose. Every thief and sexual deviant in Hanover was questioned, and...
Through dogged detective work and a series of strange coincidences, a suspect by the name of Friedrich, known as Fritz, Harman, was taken to the court prison. The man was already known to the police as both a dealer in clothing and meat, and to the criminal investigation department due to his publicly homosexual status.
His appearance and mannerisms in the ultra-conservative days of interwar Germany redefined the conventional impression of murder and murderers. Harmon was certainly sympathetic in appearance, a simple man with a friendly open expression and courteous nature. Of average height, broad and well-built, he had a rough full moon face and neat cheerful eyes.
His features were generally small and as unprepossessing as the rest of his appearance, only notability being a well-groomed, light-brown, toothbrush moustache. Kritz's expression closed up completely as soon as the atmosphere became embarrassing, and investigating officers soon realized that their suspect was a man of deep contrast.
"'at times cagey and calculating, yet also talkative and hyperactive, "'desperately seeking sympathy and attention. "'His soft, white hands moved nervously, "'plucking and pulling constantly at his long fingers. "'While Harmon's body was strong and coarse, "'it was also slightly feminine, "'and his speech was like the querulous voice of an old woman.'
The killer's almost constant defensiveness and embarrassment was reflected in his automatisms and stereotypes. The wiggling of his behind, the licking of his lips, even the constant blinking of his eyes. Harmon loved feminine pastimes, such as baking and cooking, but would smoke strong cigars at the same time.
Although his appearance was, as the Hanover police stated, far from evil, Fritz Harman would eventually enter the record books as Germany's most prolific killer. Most of Fritz's known murders took place in 1923 and 1924, with 13 in the first year and 13 in the latter.
However, since we know his first murder took place as early as 1918, and he only spent a short time in jail in 1919, it is not unlikely that many more murders took place in the four years when no murders are accounted for. Throughout the panic that engulfed Hanover in 1924, Fritz Harman remained a definite suspect, along with every other local sex offender involved.
He was investigated repeatedly during May and June, yet no conclusive evidence could be found. Meanwhile, press announcements appeared giving details of the skulls in the hope of obtaining clues from the general public. The quantity of the skulls and corpses still being discovered was generating a nationwide furor and a general lack of confidence in the German police force.
With the pressure mounting, the following course of action was agreed upon. As Harman already knew the town officials, two young policemen would arrive from Berlin at Hanover train station pretending to be homeless and looking for a place to stay. They would then focus on the suspect's activities and hope to catch him in the act. Fritz was found arguing with a 15-year-old Karl Fromm, a boy who had spent several days at Harman's apartment.
"'From was being particularly cheeky and supercilious on this evening, "'and amazingly, Harmon had the audacity to report him to the railway police, "'claiming that he was travelling on false papers. "'Once at a police station, though, From turned the tables on the older man "'by accusing him of sexual harassment during his stay.'
Coincidentally, a member of the vice squad was at the station at this time and, in the knowledge that the police were hoping to arrest Harmon, the officer decided to apprehend the suspect immediately. Before any unnecessary suspicions could be aroused, Harmon was taken to prison on the morning of the 23rd of June.
The killer later claimed that he had only arranged to have Fromm taken into custody because he knew he was going to murder the boy, and was afraid he would not be able to resist the urge for much longer. If this statement is to be believed, here was the first time that Harmon's actions were motivated by any moral scruples, and these alleged feelings of guilt were to prove his downfall.
Yet the case was not nearly as clear-cut as the substantial evidence would imply. Several hundred items of clothing found in Harmon's room, or confiscated from his acquaintances, were collected and identified as the property of the missing children and young men. But there was no evidence to declare he had been responsible for even one of the deaths.
Harman inevitably claimed that the property in his possession was due to his business of trading and dealing in used clothes. He openly admitted having sexual relations with some of the children, yet denied any knowledge of the victim's current whereabouts, and gave plausible explanations for the traces of blood present in the garments. The suspect once displayed considerable skill at avoiding taxing questions and prolonging the inquisition.
Harmon was an astute man and, understanding the rather secretive nature of homosexuality at the time, subsequently knew it would be difficult for the police to obtain incriminating evidence from his victims and their families. One of these victims was a boy named Robert Witzel, whose parents had continually besieged the police since their son's disappearance on the 26th of April 1924.
When the first skulls were found later that year, Hare Witzel was persuaded to examine the evidence in order to confirm that his son's irregular jawbone was one of their discovered crania. All that was known at this time was that Robert had visited a local circus on the night of his disappearance with his best friend, the sly and girlish Fritz Karlmeier.
Fritz, silent throughout the entire ordeal, would only say that the boys had travelled to the circus with a police official from the railway station. The reason for the boys' secretive nature was understandable. He, too, had been approached and sexually abused by Harmon, who subsequently procured him for homosexual society gentleman. Items of Witzel's clothing were found in the killer's apartment, yet Harmon would still not confess.
The breakthrough came when a couple walked into the police station and passed the Witzel family, who sat outside the chief commissioner's office. Frau Witzel immediately recognized the man's jacket and asked as to where he had obtained the garment. The man admitted that he had acquired the coat from Harmon and even provided an identification card in the trousers bearing the name Witzel. The lady accompanying him was Frau Engel.
Harman's landlady, who happened to be in the police station making inquiries concerning her tenant's military pension. An enormous stroke of luck, in addition to the fabric evidence, and, more importantly, one which finally convinced Harman to concede defeat.
The prisoner was subsequently subjected to incessant and severe questioning, before being given relief and encouragement commensurate with the unburdening of the conscience. After seven days of maniacal and emotional rages, Harmon broke down and asked for the superintendent and examining magistrate, to whom he would make a full confession.
The killer then took to court officials on a murder tour of Hanover. There were shown parts of corpses hidden in bushes, bones dredged from a lake, and skeletons concealed around the city. Inevitably, more and more people stepped forward, who obtained clothing or meat from either Harmon or Granz, and the evidence snowballed. Harmon's character also changed during this period.
He now opened up to the investigating authorities and displayed the helpful, childish and often sarcastic side to his nature. Only if confronted by the parents of the victims, or if discussing the act of decapitation, would the killer withdraw himself again. The general impression was that he felt relieved of a terrible burden by being able to discuss the darkness and fear of his abnormal sex life.
There was also a distinct degree of pride in having duped mankind, of whom Harmon always spoke badly. As a result of the information secured, Hans Granz was arrested on the 8th of July, and the two men met on several occasions before their trials began. At these times, Harmon was always troubled, whereas Granz appeared indifferent to the entire affair.
Arman remained in the prison until 16th of August, before being sent to nearby Gottingen for a psychiatric examination. The trial, unprecedented in German judicial history, contained 60 volumes of files and opened on the 4th of December, 1924. The trial was conducted at the Hanover Azizis and lasted through 14 days and almost 200 witnesses.
The much-publicized opening decree stated that Fritz Harman was accused of killing 27 persons intentionally and deliberately from September of 1918 to June of 1924. Harman insisted on conducting his own defense and remained entirely nonchalant throughout the entire trial. At one point, he even complained that there were too many women in the courtroom.
He was allowed remarkable freedom and was notably immature and irresponsible, frequently interrupting the proceedings. When he asked indignantly why there were so many women in the court, the judge answered apologetically that he had no power to keep them out.
On another occasion, when a mother became too distraught to give evidence about her son with clarity, Harmon got bored and asked to be allowed to smoke a cigar. Permission was immediately granted. Nonetheless, the murderer's naive combination of fiction and fact was generally agreed as refreshing, in contrast to the legal speak of the jurists and the confused hypocrisy of the authorities.
To the journalists, he once said reproachfully, You are not to lie. We know you are all liars. And to the jury, keep it short. I want to spend Christmas in heaven with my mother. Harmon was constantly amused by the proceedings and, remarkably, even brought a smile from the public on more than one occasion.
In contrast, Hans Granz, accused in two cases of instigating murder, appeared as a tough and unbreakable character. The jury subsequently branded him as the more dangerous, yet the more innocent, of the two. Granz was entirely focused on self-preservation, an attitude that was to prove his downfall as Harmon became concentrated on his devilish desire for revenge.
to take the one he loved the most with him to the Dark Land. Hence Fritz formed incredible and completely inaccurate accusations of murder against his partner, that the court wholeheartedly believed. Once he had achieved his aim of not going to death alone, Harmon quieted down and let Granz do the talking.
Inevitably, though, the most chilling tale of all came when Harmon took the stand to explain his murder method in most graphic of detail, and the listener, I quote, "'I never intended to hurt those youngsters, but I knew that if I got going something would happen, and that made me cry.'
I would throw myself on top of those boys and bite through their Adam's apple, throttling them at the same time. End quote. This statement, dear listener, needs to be elaborated upon. Harmon chose to bite the victims, not only out of sadistic sexual desire, but because, due to the tender age of his victims, their Adam's apple would not have been fully formed and not yet hardened.
When Harman started kissing his young victim, the kisses turned to caresses. But when he became aroused, he would bite down upon their larynxes, clamping the airway shut. He bit through the Adam's apple, crushing the larynx completely. The victim would then die from a combination of strangulation and drowning in their own blood. Harman explained the guilt he often felt at this point.
regularly collapsing on the dead body and covering the face with a cloth so it would not be looking at me. I'd make two cuts in the abdomen and put the intestines in a bucket, then soak up all the blood and crush the bones until the shoulders broke. Now I could get the heart, lungs and kidneys and chop them up and put them in my bucket. I'd take the flesh off the bones and put it in my wax cloth bag.
It would take me five or six trips to take everything and throw it down the toilet or into the river. I always hated doing this, but I couldn't help it. My passion was so much stronger than the horror of the cutting and chopping. The skulls were smashed to pieces and thrown in the river or marsh. The clothes given away or sold. Yet again, it is important to note the nature of the psychopath.
they are natural liars and even though they often brag about their actions they are sometimes ashamed of certain aspects of their crimes harman for example told the court and public that he had indeed killed those boys but he denied partaking in cannibalism
However, the flesh which Harmon had cut off the bodies was cubed or processed into mince. This was easy to use as hard currency as meat was in very high demand in those days. Harmon told, according to witnesses, that his meat comes from a butcher friend of his in the suburbs and sells it for less than half what people paid for substandard horse meat.
harman's claim of having a butcher friend was never verified and he probably made dozens if not hundreds of hanover citizens unwitting participants in cannibalism the more often this process occurred the more efficient it became and whilst the city of hanover utilized the meat and clothing of its victims fritz harman remained out of authority's reach
Some boys he denied killing. For example, a boy named Herman Wolff, whose photograph showed an ugly and ill-dressed youth. Herman declared that the boy was far too ugly to have interested him. The killer repeatedly claimed that he was driven by beauty and sensuality, not the cynical interpretation of sex or profit. In his eyes, it was easier to kill someone you loved. That way you brought them peace.
Often, after I had killed, I pleaded to be put away in the military asylum, but not a madhouse. If Granz had really loved me, he would have been able to save me. Believe me, I'm not ill. It's only that I occasionally have funny turns. I want to be beheaded. It'll only take a moment, then I'll be at peace, said Harman.
The experts then submitted their report to the effect that, although the killer had a pathological personality, he had not been devoid of free will and responsibility, and therefore bore no manic depressive insanity. Granz and Harmon continued their petty squabbles throughout the summing up, their behavior towards each other remaining the same until the bitter end.
At 10 a.m. on the 19th of December, 1924, Harmon received 24 death sentences in 24 cases and grants one death sentence for his supposed incitement to murder in the Hannapel case. Upon announcement of the verdict, Harmon proclaimed, ''I want to be executed on the marketplace.''
On the tombstone must be put this inscription. Here lies mass murderer Harmon. The court acceded to neither request. At 6 a.m. on the morning of the 15th of April, 1925, Fritz Harmon was beheaded by guillotine in the grounds of Hanover prison. In accordance with German tradition, Harmon was not informed of his execution date until the prior evening.
Upon receipt of the news, he observed prayer with his pastor, before being granted his final wishes of an expensive cigar to smoke and Brazilian coffee to drink in his cell. No members of the press were permitted to witness the execution, and the event was seen by only a handful of witnesses. According to published reports, although Harmon was pale and nervous,
He maintained a sense of bravado as he walked to the guillotine. The last words Harmon spoke were, I am guilty, gentlemen, but, hard though it may be, I want to die as a man. Immediately prior to placing his head upon the execution apparatus, Harmon added, I repent, but I do not fear death.
Interestingly, before his execution, Harmon wrote a letter to the court exonerating his long-time lover, Hans Granz, of any involvement of the killings. This letter was the direct cause of Granz being granted a retrial, where his sentence was commuted from death to only 12 years in prison. However, he did not get off quite that easy.
In 1937, the Nazis had been four years in power in Germany, and they had very clear guidelines of how to treat known homosexuals. Grahns was thus transferred from prison and sent to Sachsenhausen concentration camp. He somehow managed to survive his time in the camp and was set free on the 22nd of April in 1945. He lived there.
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