Rudolf Kerner was trained as a shoemaker and worked in his mother's shoe store in Germany. When the store was sold, he joined the police and, in 1939, was ordered to serve in the German security police. In the autumn of 1941, he was ordered to lead the security police (Sipo) in Kristiansand, becoming chief of the Gestapo for southern Norway. After the war, he was sentenced to death by the Agder Court of Appeals for severe torture. He was pardoned and expelled from Norway in 1953. (Source: Focal Point: Arkivet, 2016).