Short answers, pulled from the story.
Erich Honecker was born on the 25th of August 1912 in Neunkirchen, a town located in what is now Saarland. His father Wilhelm worked as a coal miner and political activist while his mother Caroline managed their household of six children.
In August 1961 Honecker became the prime organiser of building the Berlin Wall while serving as Security Secretary of the Socialist Unity Party Central Committee. He bore administrative responsibility for the order to fire along the Wall and the larger inner German border during which around 125 East German citizens were killed while trying to reach the West.
Frictions between Mikhail Gorbachev and Erich Honecker grew over these policies and numerous additional issues from 1985 onward because East Germany refused to implement similar reforms. Gorbachev grew to dislike Honecker lumping him with Bulgaria's Todor Zhivkov Czechoslovakia's Gustáv Husák and Romania's Nicolae Ceaușescu as Gang of Four group of inflexible hardliners unwilling to make reforms.
Erich Honecker died on the 13th of May 1994 following a diagnosis of malignant liver tumour confirmed by CT scan in August 1992. He was arrested upon arrival at Berlin Tegel Airport on the 29th of July 1992 after being ejected from the Chilean Embassy Moscow where he had sought refuge.
Prosecutors issued an arrest warrant in November 1990 charging Erich Honecker with giving orders for fire along the Inner German border in 1961 and repeatedly reiterating that command specifically in 1974. A 783-page indictment accused him of taking part in collective manslaughter of 68 people attempting to flee East Germany during his tenure.