Edmund Heines (21 July 1897 – 30 June 1934) was a German Nazi politician and Deputy to Ernst Röhm, the Stabschef of the Sturmabteilung (SA).
In 1915, Heines joined the Bavarian Army to fight in World War I after graduating from his Gymnasium, and fought on the Western Front as a field artillery operator.
In July 1920, Heines was involved in the murder of Willi Schmidt, a 20-year-old farm worker who allegedly wanted to reveal hidden arms caches of the Freikorps.
Heines was sentenced to 15 months imprisonment for his part in the failed coup d'etat and was held, together in the same cell with Adolf Hitler, at Landsberg Prison.
From 1925 to August 1926, Heines was federal director of the Schilljugend, a right-wing youth organization founded by Gerhard Roßbach now affiliated with the SA and NSDAP.
Then in November, he became a staff member in the News and Press Department of the Obersten SA-Führung (Supreme SA Leadership) serving there until April 1931.
[4] In early 1933, the establishment of Nazi Germany led to Hitler, now with access to the state apparatus including the Reichswehr, no longer requiring or desiring the street fighting antics of the SA, and seeking to marginalize the organization.
Röhm was one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany as de facto commander of the SA, and considered by Hitler to be one of few people who posed a threat to his leadership.
The Brown Book of the Reichstag Fire and Hitler Terror claimed that a clique of homosexual stormtroopers led by Heines set the Reichstag fire; the convicted arsonist Marinus van der Lubbe remained behind and agreed to accept the sole blame because of his desperation for affection; and Röhm's assistant Georg Bell [de] was killed to cover it up.
Hitler identified Heines as one of the principal members of a "small group of elements which were held together through a like disposition" in his Reichstag speech of 13 July 1934.
Heines had developed a reputation for brutality as an enforcer of the SA, known for personally killing political opponents of the NSDAP despite his high-ranking status.
In his diaries, Joseph Goebbels described Heines as "an unbalanced person, full of storm and urge, a child's head", attributing his violent nature to his background.