He spent over six months in solitary confinement
Stáhnout obrázek
Jaroslav Kaisler was born on 10 April 1935 in Uherský Brod. His father was a locksmith, his mother a cook‘s helper, and he had one brother. After finishing primary school in 1950, he began to study as a machine locksmith in ČKD Sokolovo in Prague, from where he transferred to the Higher Technical School of Mechanical Engineering in Prague‘s Betlémská Street. In his youth he was a member of Junák. After it was banned by the communists, he and his classmates from the technical school continued their activities, went on expeditions to the surroundings of Prague, and published a handwritten magazine. For the sake of spreading the magazine, they intended to steal the then unavailable cyclostyle from the grammar school in Vršovice. On the basis of a tip-off, the State Security arrested the six-member group and made charges of espionage against its members. Jaroslav Kaisler was arrested on Christmas Day, 26 December 1953, at his parents‘ home in Uherský Brod. Immediately after his arrest, he was blindfolded and handcuffed, then taken to the detention prison in Prague-Ruzyně. He spent over half a year in solitary confinement. He did not experience beatings and torture during interrogations, but he was given strange „medicine“, although he was healthy, after which he lost his balance. The closed trial of the whole group took place at the Regional Court in Prague on 15 July 1954. Kaisler walked away with an eight-year sentence for espionage. In the prison in Valdice he worked as a corridor worker, a feather plucker, and later as a milling machine operator and designer for the prison company Mechanika belonging to the Ministry of the Interior. After 5 years he was released on parole in 1959. However, as a punished enemy of the republic, he could not find a job in Uherský Brod for a long time. Then Kaisler was contacted by State Security. With the promise of a good job or threatening him with a section on social parasitism, they tried to get him to cooperate, which he refused. He eventually found work as a milling cutter in Otrokovice. At that time, he managed to finish the mechanical engineering school in Brno. He got married and after graduation enlisted in the road army for two years. After returning to civilian life, Jaroslav Kaisler became a recognized expert in the design of the poultry industry. In 1968, he became a member of KAN and K-231. Jaroslav Kaisler received the award of a participant in the anti-communist resistance.
