East German judoka Harald Heinke won a bronze medal at the 1980 Moskva Olympic Games in the half-middleweight class. At the European Championships, Heinke won gold medals in 1978 and 1979 and silver medals in 1977 and 1980. Also in 1979, he won a bronze medal at the World Championships and won his only East German national title.
Heinke became a graduated sports teacher and defected to West Germany just one year before re-unification in 1989. He worked as a judo coach with MTV Ingolstadt from 1992-98, and then returned to Schwerin where he worked as an insurance agent.