Bishop Ján Vojtaššák - Profile:
Bishop of the diocese of Spiš
Born-14 November 1877 Zakamenné
Died- 4 August 1965 @ Řičany
Biskupský úrad, 053 04 Spišské Podhradie-Kapitula, Slovenská republika

Ján Vojtaššák (1877–1965) was a Roman Catholic bishop politically orientated towards the Hlinka Slovak People's Party and identified with the very existence of the Slovak State, the Nazi German client-state that existed from 1939 to 1945. After the war, Vojtaššák came into conflict with the new regime, which endeavoured to exclude him from public life and, in particular, remove him as bishop. To this end, it conducted an investigation that aimed to bring Vojtaššák to trial. At first, in the years immediately after the war, the regime used not only domestic but also international means: it tried to get the Vatican to remove Vojtaššák from the bishopric, a ploy that initially seemed promising; later, however, from early 1947, this was no longer a relevant issue, especially in light of the worsening relations between East and West.After the Communist takeover in Czechoslovakia in February 1948, there was increased aversion to Vojtaššák, who was coming out hard against the totalitarian regime and its anti-Church policy. At the time, the regime was still constrained by international and internal factors (particularly in its talks with the Roman Catholic Church), though it considered Vojtaššák among its greatest political opponents in Slovakia. The situation was favourable for the regime to carry out its merciless reckoning with Vojtaššák in mid-1950. The priest was arrested and, in early 1951, sentenced to twenty-four years in prison ‘for crimes against the state, military treason, high treason and espionage’.