Mgr. Jaromír Dus

“I never believed that I would outlive the Communists. If I had had only the slightest idea, I´d have not tried to convince my colleagues – programmers — that even ministers were able to learn the Cobol, Assembler and Fortran systems and work as programmers. I might have learned languages and prepared myself for what I would be doing after the political change – but, well, I didn´t have enough faith in it. Shortly, I thought I would die in this system. I am eternally grateful to have lived long enough to see it.”

„This time Major Fráňa said I was a bit pale and asked if I was all right. I said yes, I was and that there was nothing wrong with me. So can we continue interrogating? Yes, we can. So, again the questions about Mr Brandt or Sharp or whoever else, and he again interrupted the interrogation: No, you´re a bit pale. I´ll send you to hospital. – OK, to hospital. Later I learned that this was the day when my lawyer Dr.Runt was coming to see me for the first time. So, when he came he was told that I didn´t feel well during the interrogation and the interrogator had to send me to hospital and what would happen next, nobody knew. This was the last message my family received from me. Also, they harrassed my wife as well – at that time she was already working at the Bulovka Hospital – it was Friday evening and it was her night shift – Fráňa phoned her that he needed her for interrogation. She reacted – I can´t find anyone to replace me right now, I´m at work. – Well, if you don´t want to help your husband, it´s your problem. So, she did her best, managed to find a colleague willing to do the night shift, travelled to the Ruzyně Prison and the first question he had was what the date of my birth was (of course, they had had this information many times over). The second question was how and where I met Mr Pachman. She said - As far as I know my husband doesn´t know any Mr Pachman. He doesn´t play chess at all, only his father was a bit of a chess player. To sum it up: being in prison was worse for family members than for me or anybody else.“