Johannes Lapmann papers

Lapmann, Johannes (Lapman) (Johannes-Rudolf?) Born on April 3.1913 in Vihterpalu parish, Harjumaa, Estonia. Sailor, mechanic. From 1927 J. Lapmann served as a sailor on many boats. In 1930s worked at an Estonian newspaper in New York. He decided to return to Estonia in 1940, where he became chairman of a local Soviet council. However, when the Soviet Union took over Estonia after the Hitler-Stalin Pact, Lapmann grew disenchanted with the Communists. He began protesting publicly, and was charged with counter-revolution and betraying his homeland. He was sentenced to 15 years in Siberian prison camps. Released in 1958, Lapmann returned to Estonia. But he was unhappy living under the Soviet system. On 10.09.1972, he tried to escape across the Baltic Sea in a small boat, the attempt failed. This time, he was declared insane and sentenced to a Soviet psychiatric hospital. He was finally released in 1989. His mission was to reform the USSR economy, he also wrote a manuscript about ideological economy. He wrote he had "discovered a new precise and extremely important program of reorganization the USSR economy".

When he was freed in 1989 he was invited to the United States by a Seattle journalist who had interviewed Lapmann. Lapmann lived as a homeless on the streets of New York in 1990. Determined to clear his name, he went to Moscow and, after a hearing, received a certificate from the Independent Psychiatric Association declaring that he was sane and was wrongly institutionalized. He also won verdicts that Estonian courts had violated his human rights. Father: Juhan; Sister: Elfriede (1908-1988).

More information about Johannes Lapmann: "Human Rights Internet Reporter." By Human Rights Internet. Published by Human Rights Internet, 1982.