26. 3. 2014 15:05
Member of the anti-communist resistance and opposition recognised by the Ethics Commission - Vladislav Palát
Vladislav Palát was born in 1929, in the village of Jablůnka in the Vsetín region. He now lives in Nové Město na Moravě.
The resistance group of which Vladislav Palát was a member was established by his brother, Jaromír Palát, in autumn 1948, after he entered basic military service by joining the garrison in Hranice. Jaromír and Vladislav Palát were active participants in what was known as the 2nd resistance during the Second World War, and were members of the resistance group “Jaroš Žižka 10” in their home region, which was part of the first partisan brigade “Jan Žižka” (with a crew in Hory Hostýnské); this group was established and led by Jaromír Palát. Vladislav Palát was the chandler and intermediary in the group.
By 1946 Jaromír and Vladislav Palát were again trying to get hold of weapons. Vladislav Palát gradually acquired several weapons (e.g. an MP 44 submachine gun, two Parabellum and Steyr pistols, two old revolvers), which he and Jaromír Palát hid in their room and later in a barn at their parents’ house in Jablůnka. In October 1948 Jaromír Palát entered basic military service by joining the garrison in Hranice, where he met Alois Janíček, a Czechoslovak Army staff sergeant, who shared similar views; they founded the resistance group together. It was the task of this group to acquire other members, arms them and engage in armed action (“destructive and terrorist action”, as described in the judgment). Jaromír Palát and Alois Janíček’s primary aim was to amass weapons for a possible coup d’état. Alois Janíček, who was in charge of the garrison’s clothing store in Hranice, agree that Jaromír Palát would leave the military rifle he had found while tidying up the store. Jaromír Palát, with the help of Alois Janíček and through Warrant Officer Max Sochorek, also obtained other weapons (one 44/scythe/ submachine gun with two magazines, a large quantity of rifle ammunition, rounds for the rocket pistol and grenade detonators). They put these towards arming the group.
Vladislav Palát became involved in his brother’s activities in April 1949, when, while on holiday, his brother asked him to transfer and conceal weapons acquired during the course of his military service in Hranice. Vladislav Palát then provided the group with weapons he had acquired earlier. They first hid those weapons at their house in Jablůnka, then with the forester František Kotrla and his brother Ladislav Kotrla from Jablůnka (the weapons from Hranice and a 9 mm Parabellum pistol) and later with František Spáčil in the same village. They provided one weapon to František Adámek from Pržmo (a 7.65 mm Steyr pistol).
From the records it is evident that Vladislav Palát accompanied Alois Janíček to visit Florián Minařík, who was to mediate Alois Janíček’s escape abroad. Vladislav Palát therefore acted as a de facto intermediary, between his brother Jaromír Palát, Alois Janíček and, in this case, Florián Minařík.
From 1950 Vladislav Palát was employed in the armoury in Jablůnka. In the spring of 1950 Jaromír and Vladislav Palát planned to steal weapons from the People’s Militia arsenal in the armoury in Jablůnka. Vladislav Palát was given a plan of the armoury by an acquaintance of his, Zbyněk Gabryš, who worked there as a technical clerk. They also planned to involve František Kotrla, who was supposed to hide them before and after the raid. They were supposed to go armed. However, the plan was never carried out, as according to Zbyněk Gabryš the weapons store had been moved and Vladislav Palát was unable to find out where the weapons were located. Vladislav Palát added on 6. 12. 2013 that the real reason that the raid did not take place was that he had to go into basic military service.
On 1. 10. 1950 Vladislav Palát entered into basic military service with the military corps in Bratislava. He was arrested on 28. 4. 1952 at the military corps in Bohuslavice. Judicial proceedings with the entire group “Jaromír Palát et al.” were held on 15. and 16. 10. 1952 before the State Court – Brno department. The trial convicted 7 people, many with very heavy sentences (ranging from 6 to 19 years’ imprisonment without probation). A decision passed by the State Court – Brno department on 16. 10. 1952 found Vladislav Palát guilty of the crime of treason as defined by § 78 Para. 1c, 2a and 3d of the Penal Code; he was sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment, fined 5,000 CZK, and stripped of his honorary civil rights for 5 years and all his assets were forfeited. Vladislav Palát served his sentence in TNP Rovnost in the region of Jáchymov, where he remained until the amnesty granted in 1960. Vladislav Palát was exonerated through a decision passed by the Regional Court in Ostrava on 8. 11. 1990.
The Ethics Committee has therefore proven that, through the actions described above, Vladislav Palát was involved in the resistance and struggle against communism as defined by the provisions of § 3 Para. 3 and § 3 Para. 2 b) of Act No. 262/2011 Coll. following the provisions of § 2 b) of Act No. 262/2011 Coll., as he was an active member of an organisation or group whose members fought against the communist regime in the ways specified in the above provisions, i.e. by engaging in other demonstrably anti-communist activities directly or indirectly aimed at restoring freedom and democracy or weakening the communist regime, with the aim of removing, significantly weakening or impairing or otherwise damaging the communist totalitarian regime in Czechoslovakia and restoring freedom and democracy. The Ethics Committee has established that Vladislav Palát was a member of a group that consistently (systematically) and in the long term (from 1948 to 1950) prepared, particularly by amassing weapons, to engage in armed action (sabotage and destruction) directed against the communist regime, and whose members intended to participate in the resistance and struggle against communism by participating in an armed uprising. The Ethics Committee adds that it has no doubt that Vladislav Palát engaged in these activities for the resistance group knowingly and actively, with the aim (as soon as a suitable opportunity were to present itself) of actively fighting against the communist regime with weapon in hand.