A skilled and popular preacher and retreat leader, Richard was known for condemning the ideology and actions of the Nazis, especially the murder of disabled people and others considered an unproductive burden on society. He was arrested for this on 7 March 1937 in Roppach, Germany, but was warned and released. Father Richard became an indirect collaborator with the Resistance, and spoke so forcefully and so often against the Nazis that his superiors began to worry that the Nazis would retaliate against the school where Richard taught. He was arrested again on 8 April 1943 in Branitz, Germany for making political statements, and was imprisoned first at Ratibor, Germany, and then in the Dachau concentration camp where he was forced to do manual labour for the SS, and where he would remain the rest of his life. He became friends with fellow prisoner and future Cardinal, Josef Beran, who taught Father Richard the Czech language so he could help minister to imprisoned Czechs. When typhoid broke out in the camp, Father Richard volunteer to minister to the sick until he contracted the illness himself.
On 22 February 1945 he died in cell block 17 of the Dachau concentration camp in Germany of typhoid that he had contracted while caring for fellow prisoners. His body was cremated and his ashes were smuggled out of the camp and given Christian burial in Limburg, Germany on 7 June 1945. His ashes were re-interred in Limburg in 1990
