Female camp secretary to face trial

"A 96-year-old Nazi death camp secretary who went on the run in Germany ahead of a murder trial has been caught, the court has said.
Irmgard Furchner, who has been dubbed the 'secretary of evil', had been due to stand trial in Itzehoe Regional Court today on charges of assisting in the deaths of 11,412 prisoners at the Stutthof death camp between 1943 and 1945.
But Judge Dominik Gross was forced to suspend the case at 10.10am and launch a manhunt for the nonagenarian after she failed to appear.
The court heard that she was last seen leaving her nursing home in a taxi before 7.30am and heading towards a local train station.
At 1.50pm, police tracked Furchner to a street in northern Hamburg, roughly five miles from where she was last seen. It is thought that she caught a train into the city, before setting out on foot.
She is now being held at a police station close to where she was found and is being questioned by officers, Bild reported.
The court will now decide whether to remand her in custody. Furchner's original hearing on the murder charges has been suspended until October 19.
Shortly after she went missing, it emerged that she had written a handwritten letter to the court on September 8 saying she would not attend her trial while asking to be tried in absentia - something that is not permitted under German law.
She wrote: 'Due to my age and physical limitations I will not attend the court dates and ask the defense attorney to represent me.
'I would like to spare myself these embarrassments and not make myself the mockery of humanity.'
However, it appears no one believed she would actually attempt to flee the trial."
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10044983/Manhunt-96-year-old-Nazi-death-camp-secretary-fails-turn-trial.html

 

Interesting read. I remember reading about her a while ago before she was to appear at a definite date. So, now they have her. What are they going to do, sentence her to prison time? Is it never too late? Is she telling the truth about not knowing about the mass executions? I have mixed emotions, to tell you the truth. She’s very old now. Some will say it’s never too old to go to prison for being part of the holocaust. Opinions are good. Everyone should have one. Personally, I don’t think she should be imprisoned.

 

And I completely understand your opinion.

 

My two cents is that she should be tried and even sentenced...but clemency be granted. Its a way of advertising the history, bringing the accused to justice. But also an opportunity to take the high ground on the matter.

 

Guilty and community service. Go to schools and tell of the horrors of the camp. The humiliation she will face each time she got up and spoke to the students.

 

Death camp? Did not know? What bs. The court shall decide.

 

Apparently, in Germany, her biggest crime is still being alive.

All those Holocaust criminal were allowed to live out their lives and die in the 50's, 60's, 70's, 80's, 90's. The only ones alive now were very young.

Back then so many more of the major players (industrialists (employing slave labour in terrible conditions), lawyers (bent and changed the law to allow the immoral), police, doctors, guards, accountants (willingly accounted appropriated and stolen property) were still alive. Had these people been adequately pursued by the justice system, then I would have little beef. Most were not. Already before 1950 most of Germany was tired of the process, and most of these people were left alone. Many convicted had their sentences shortened.

German law changed, and all of the leading lights are long dead. So now they dredge up minor cogs with the misfortune to still be alive that were somehow associated to the camps. For me this is not justice.

Judge Herbet stated at the IG Farben Trial:

"... the record shows that Farben willingly cooperated and gladly utilized each new source of manpower as it developed. Disregard of basic human rights did not deter these defendants.

Willing cooperation with the slave labor utilization of the Third Reich was a matter of corporate policy that permeated the whole Farben organization ... For this reason, criminal responsibility goes beyond the actual immediate participants at Auschwitz. It includes other Farben Vorstand plant-managers and embraces all who knowingly participated in the shaping of the corporate policy."

Yet almost all of the Plant Leaders were found "innocent." No one at that trial received more than 8 years, and most much, much less. IG Farben manufactured the Zyklon B, and employed slave labour.

At the Krupp trial, all eleven defendants found guilty were convicted on the forced labor charge. Six were convicted. On January 31, 1951, two and a half years after the sentences, all except Löser the former CFO were released from prison. Since no buyer for the Krupp Holding had been found, Alfried Krupp resumed control of the firm in 1953.

There were only three industries tried by the International Tribunal (IG Farben, Krupp, and Flick). Germany was supposed to continue pursuing Nazi criminals, but failed to adequately do so at the time, when the majority of the criminals were alive, and memories were fresh.

I'm sorry, but I find this sudden need to actively pursue these still living criminals farcical. Complacency has reigned for too long. Far too many have been allowed to live out their lives. However you look at it, it's rotten.