Der Staatsanwalt hat das Wort: Ich bin Joop van der Dalen (1982)

Klaus-Peter Maier already had three previous convictions, each of which had landed him behind bars. The offenses were fraud, confidence tricks, theft, and marriage fraud; his manner, which made him seem decent, open, intelligent, and charming, helped him commit them. His last conviction sent him to prison for three years and six months. After serving his third sentence, Klaus-Peter Maier is met at the prison gate in Brandenburg at the end of November by Pastor Hersfeld, who had visited him from time to time during his incarceration and taken some care of him. His first stop is the police station, where he is informed about the state’s monitoring measures to come, including reporting weekly to the ABV responsible for him. He will work for the Leipzig Housing Construction Combine (VEB Wohnungsbaukombinat) and, at his request, will be given accommodation in its workers’ dormitory, since he absolutely does not want to go to his father’s home. After moving into a double room at the dormitory, he arranges to meet his sister in town. They go to a café and talk about the past, including his training as a gardener, until they argue about their father and then decide never to talk about the past again. At the construction site, Klaus-Peter is assigned as a signalman, but he makes nothing but mistakes, infuriating his coworkers. After work, he goes to Pastor Hersfeld to tell him about his worries. These include the smoke-filled room where his roommate and three other coworkers are always playing Skat; the fact that he cannot move in with his sister because she no longer lives alone; and his search for a second job so he can earn more money for a more comfortable life. From his wages, 9,000 marks are being deducted in installments as compensation for his previous offenses. The pastor therefore offers him occasional small paid jobs for the church, an offer he will take up. The next day, he wants to apply to his company’s personnel manager for permission to take a second job, but the manager is on vacation. When Klaus-Peter tries to make plans for the Christmas holidays with the personnel manager’s secretary, Christine Lemberg, whom he is attracted to, he learns that she is about to get engaged. He then decides to spend those days with his sister, but she plans to go with her boyfriend to visit his parents. Although he is not allowed to leave his place of residence without notifying the ABV, he goes to the Hotel Neptun in Warnemünde and spends the holidays there. Back at the dormitory, the manager asks where he has been, since he was seen at the railway station. Klaus-Peter says he was at his sister’s. Naturally, the dormitory manager, who is responsible for monitoring him, checks with the sister and learns that Klaus-Peter has a key to her apartment. A conversation takes place at her apartment, attended by her boyfriend Kurt Fries, who works as an agricultural pilot and now fears losing his job because of Klaus-Peter. Their father, Maier, also comes to visit, but leaves again as soon as he sees his son. By the time the holidays are over, the personnel manager has returned, but he refuses Klaus-Peter permission to take a second job, saying there are plenty of opportunities to work overtime at his own company. Angry, Maier leaves the personnel department, the construction site, and the Housing Construction Combine dormitory. While walking across the exhibition grounds, he spots a Dutch truck delivering exhibition items and impulsively hitches a ride with it on its return journey, as far as Jena. When Klaus-Peter gets out of the truck right in front of a hospital, he pretends to have a heart attack and has himself admitted. He tells the doctor he has no papers, only a business card. He got it from the driver, however, and now claims to be that man. A witness also confirms that he got out of a Dutch car before suffering the attack. Since the examination reveals no acute illness, he is discharged, but at his request he receives a certificate stating that Joop van der Dalen had been treated there. After making a detour through several churches, whose pastors help him because of his tall tales, he reaches Berlin. At the Palasthotel, he uses the hospital certificate to book a room and says he plans to go to the Dutch embassy the next day to get new papers. Before leaving the hotel the next day, he packs everything in the room’s refrigerator into a bag and takes it with him, naturally without paying for his stay. He now plans to travel by train to the south of the GDR. He is alone in a compartment when another passenger gets on. They strike up a conversation, and Klaus-Peter introduces himself as Joop van der Dalen, a Dutch water-engineering engineer. Having just read an article in a magazine about the well-known Delta Plan, he claims to be working on it. His fellow passenger is very interested in the subject, and the two talk about it until the German goes to fetch a few bottles of beer from the MITROPA dining car. Klaus-Peter takes advantage of his absence to search the man’s coat and steal several checks. At the next station, he gets off and cashes them at several post offices, immediately spending the money on a camera. Meanwhile, his fellow passenger notices the checks are missing and reports it to the police. After thinking it over for a long time, he remembers that he left his coat hanging unattended in the compartment for a few minutes. Based on the description he provides, a lieutenant shows him a photograph of Mr. Maier, who is already the subject of an intensive manhunt, and he recognizes him. But by then, Mr. Maier is already in a taxi headed for the Hotel Panorama in Oberhof, where he checks into an apartment under his real name. In the hotel restaurant, he meets two pretty young women who are happy to let him treat them. They spend a cheerful afternoon together and then go to the nightclub. As he is at the reception desk trying to buy a bottle of wine for the night, two detectives are already standing beside him and ask him to come with them immediately. During questioning, he continues to insist that he is Joop van der Dalen and wants to speak to his embassy at once. The film then concludes with remarks by Dr. Peter Przybylski, a prosecutor at the GDR’s General Prosecutor’s Office, who also delivered the introductory remarks. He explains that after Mr. Maier’s release from prison, many opportunities to reintegrate him into society were missed, making his return to crime easier. However, he also lacked remorse and a sense of guilt, which contributed to his renewed offenses. The damage caused by the check fraud now amounts to almost 15,000 marks. A further sum of almost 3,000 marks resulted from theft and fraudulent borrowing. Since Klaus-Peter Maier had already been convicted several times, the new sentence was made more severe because he had learned no lessons from his previous convictions. The court sentenced the defendant to four years and six months’ imprisonment for criminal fraud to the detriment of socialist property, as well as theft and fraud to the detriment of personal property, committed concurrently with endangering public order and security through antisocial behavior and violating state monitoring measures. The defendant was also ordered to compensate for the damage caused.