Hamburg (AP) - A former SS security guard from the Stutthof concentration camp testified before the court that he could not do anything with the ideologies of the National Socialists. «I never shared that. I was not in favor of the opinion of the SS, »said the 93-year-old before the Hamburg district court.
"I definitely didn't share the view that one had to kill Jewish children so that they wouldn't become the avengers of tomorrow," he said. The co-plaintiffs' lawyers questioned the defendant and primarily wanted to know if he knew about atrocities, murders and children in the Gdańsk camp and shared the Nazi ideology.
According to the public prosecutor, the accused, who lived in Hamburg, was a young man from August 1944 to April 1945 in the Stutthof concentration camp. The defendant is accused of murder aid in 5230 cases. He is said to have "supported the insidious and cruel killing of Jewish prisoners in particular". The case is being tried in the juvenile penal chamber because the suspect was 17 and 18 years old at the time of the crime.
The 93-year-old said on Friday that he hadn't noticed any children in the camp. The accused repeatedly asserted that he did not know or see that children were hanged or shot in the camp. For years he had tried to ignore the fact that he had to do duty in the camp. «I tried to forget what happened there. I suppressed it. »Meanwhile he also talks to his grandchildren about it.
The trial will continue on January 24 with a further report by historian Stefan Hördler. The court had last scheduled ten new appointments by mid-May.
Prosecutor's press release dated April 18, 2019 on the indictment
"Mirror" to Moshe Peter Loth
