German court convicts Demjanjuk of Nazi war crimes

[Book]

http://uk.reuters.com/resources/r/?m...OPTP_0_GERMANY

German court convicts Demjanjuk of Nazi war crimes

(Reuters) - A German court sentenced John Demjanjuk to five years in prison Thursday for his role in the killing of 27,900 Jews at the Nazi death camp Sobibor.

His lawyers will appeal the verdict.

The Munich court found the 91-year-old guilty of being an accessory to mass murder as a guard at Sobibor camp in Poland during World War Two.

Demjanjuk had been exonerated in a separate Holocaust trial two decades ago in Israel, where he was initially sentenced to death for being the notorious "Ivan the Terrible" camp guard at Treblinka in Poland. The ruling was overturned by Israel's supreme court after new evidence exonerated him.

Ukraine-born Demjanjuk, who was once top of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre's list of most wanted Nazi war criminals, said he was drafted into the Soviet army in 1941 then taken prisoner of war by the Germans. Demjanjuk attended the 18-month court proceedings in Munich -- birthplace of Adolf Hitler's Nazi movement -- in a wheelchair and sometimes lying down, with his family trying to argue that he was too frail to stand trial. His son, John Demjanjuk Jr., said in an e-mail ahead of the verdict that his father was a victim of the Nazis and of post-war Germany.

"While those who refuse to accept that reality may take satisfaction from this event, nothing the Munich court can do will atone for the suffering Germany has perpetrated upon him to this day," he said. Prosecutors had faced several hurdles in proving Demjanjuk's guilt, with no surviving witnesses to his crimes and heavy reliance on wartime documents, namely a Nazi ID card that defence attorneys said was a fake made by the Soviets.

Guards at Nazi death camps like Sobibor were essential to the mass killing of Jews because extermination was the focus of such camps, prosecutors said. Some 250,000 Jews were killed at Sobibor, according to the Wiesenthal Centre. Defence attorney Ulrich Busch told the Munich court on Wednesday that even if Demjanjuk did become a prison guard, he did so only because as a prisoner of war he would have either been shot by the Nazis or died of starvation. Demjanjuk emigrated to the United States in the early 1950s and became a naturalised citizen in 1958, working as an engine mechanic in Ohio.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2011/0...74B1ZW20110512

[ShortJohnSilver]

How many central bankers who funded the war from both side were charged with war crimes?

Was Chris Dodd's father, recipient and promoter of false testimony and torture-induced confessions at Nuremburg, ever charged?

[MNeagle]

Court Orders Demjanjuk To Be Released

Posted: May 12th, 2011 9:52 AM

MUNICH — A German court has ordered John Demjanjuk released pending an appeal of his conviction as an accessory to murder at a Nazi death camp.

Presiding Judge Ralph Alt made the announcement as he wrapped up his verdict Thursday in the 91-year-old's trial. It could take six months or more for an appeal verdict to come.

It's not unusual for people awaiting appeals in Germany to be freed — and Alt said that Demjanjuk, who is stateless and was deported from the U.S. two years ago, has no opportunity to flee.

It wasn't immediately clear where he would go.

Demjanjuk was sentenced to five years in prison. He was found guilty of 28,060 counts of being an accessory to murder during the time he was ruled to have been a guard at the Sobibor camp in Nazi-occupied Poland.

Retired U.S. autoworker John Demjanjuk was convicted of thousands of counts of acting as an accessory to murder at a Nazi death camp and sentenced on Thursday to five years in prison, a groundbreaking verdict that closed one chapter in a decades-long legal battle.

Demjanjuk was found guilty of 28,060 counts of being an accessory to murder, one for each person who died during the time he was ruled to have been a guard at the Sobibor camp in Nazi-occupied Poland.

Presiding Judge Ralph Alt said the 91-year-old was a piece of the Nazis' "machinery of destruction."

"The court is convinced that the defendant ... served as a guard at Sobibor from 27 March 1943 to mid September 1943," Alt said, closing a trial that has lasted nearly 18 months.

Demjanjuk sat in a wheelchair in front of the judges as they announced their verdict, but showed no reaction. He has denied the charges, but declined the opportunity to make a final statement to the court.

Demjanjuk's son, John Demjanjuk Jr., said the defense would appeal. He asserted that "the Germans have built a house of cards and it will not stand for long."

Charges of accessory to murder carry a maximum term of 15 years in Germany, which does not allow consecutive sentences for multiple counts of the same crime.

There was no evidence that Demjanjuk committed a specific crime. The prosecution was based on the theory that if Demjanjuk was at the camp, he was a participant in the killing — the first time such a legal argument has been made in German courts.

Thomas Walther, who led the investigation that prompted Germany to prosecute Demjanjuk, said before the verdict that other low-ranking Nazi helpers could now face prosecution.

"It could be very soon that more are brought to the table," he said. "This case is a door-opener."

Integral to the prosecution's case was an SS identity card that allegedly shows a picture of a young Demjanjuk, and indicates he trained at the SS Trawniki camp and was posted to Sobibor.

Though court experts said the card appears genuine, the defense maintains it is a fake produced by the Soviet KGB.

http://thelakewoodview.com/impact/co...o-be-released/

[General of Darkness]

These fricken zionist backed kangaroo courts have destroyed any form of justice that might exist in the world. I find the judge, the prosecutors, and witnesses all collaborators of treason against mankind and should be dealt with accordingly.

[SHTF2010]

HOLOCAUST HOLOCAUST


http://www.richardsilverstein.com/ti...ads/foxman.jpg

[JDRock]

..still prosecuting obscure camp guards, and yet they have never... i mean NEVER from day 1 EVER mounted a serious attempt to find hitler :lol...hmmm.. o-->...maybe because he had jewish blood.... o-->...maybe because he had jews on his cabinet o-->...maybe because he NEVER exterminated a SINGLE rich jew banker o-->...maybe because he was financed by jews o-->
maybe, because he NEVER EVER WAS an enemy of the jews. :taunt:

[Grand Master Melon]

What a joke this is.

Sentencing a guy for doing his job is retarded. Wasting money to prosecute this guy is retarded.

Germany is retarded. Germany needs to get over itself and learn to accept it's past instead of trying to make the world feel better with nonsensical PC crap like this.

[Ponce]

They must have their pound of flesh to keep their lies alive........

[Uncle Salty]

And the charade continues....

[Bigjon]

What a joke this is.

Sentencing a guy for doing his job is retarded. Wasting money to prosecute this guy is retarded.

Germany is retarded. Germany needs to get over itself and learn to accept it's past instead of trying to make the world feel better with nonsensical PC crap like this.

Germany is another ZOG country, WWII delivered the Germans into the Jews hands.