The administration of Gherla prison

GHERLA is a large prison that was originally built as a barracks for soldiers and officers during the Austro-Hungarian Empire, but now serves mainly as a prison for anti-communist workers and peasants. In addition to the workers and peasants, hundreds of intellectuals also died here.

Three are the notorious communist commanders who carried out the programme of destroying opponents of the regime:

– The first was called Lazarus. He was a Jew who had sided with Communism with all his being. He had a simple method of committing crimes without leaving any traces or being accused of murder.

– The second commander of the prison was Gheorghiu. It was under his command that the crimes of re-education were carried out after the end of Pitesti. Stupid and full of sadism, he boasted that he was part of Gheorghiu-Dej’s team and a CFRist like him.

At some point he disappeared from the prison, and not long after his disappearance the tortures of re-education stopped.

– The third villain was Goiciu, a beast ready to tear apart any prisoner.

In the villainy of which he was the master, he invented in Gherla some cells the size of coffins, in which punished prisoners had to stand for up to seven days. Many died in prison or after being released from those cells.

(Octavian Voinea – The Massacre of the Romanian Students, by Gheorghe Andreica)