Historical trial of a 93-year-old Nazi concentration camp guard

The beginning of the trial clearly shows that it is an extraordinary case. "If the defendant collapses, immediately expel the place", Warns the judge in room 300 of the Hamburg court. The defendant is Bruno Dey, a 93-year-old man who, 76 years ago, worked as a guardian of the Nazi concentration camp Stutthof, located in present-day Poland. The, executed tens of thousands of people and now justice accuses him, at the twilight of his life, of cooperating with the Nazi regime.

At 11:10, Dey enters the wheelchair room, accompanied by three doctors and the face covered with a red card. Most men like him, considered the necessary parts of the Nazi machinery, they are dead or are about to die.

This case could be one of the last 76 years after one of the most tragic episodes in history, six million Jews died. Therefore, the trial that started last Thursday in Hamburg against Dey transcends this case and has generated hope and hope among survivors and their families. The guards who worked in the extermination camps were those who had seen, according to the prosecution, those who had collaborated in the consumption of the Holocaust and those who now, as in the case of Bruno Dey. , They can send the signal that justice is done. Seven decades of delay and dropper.

When the photographers leave, the room is absolutely silent. At 93, Dey takes off her hat and sunglasses. He has white hair, a mustache and looks much younger than him. He confirms his identity in a trembling voice to the judge, then listens silently to the accusations that weigh on him. He is accused of cooperating in the killing of 5,230 people, starved, gassed or executed, because guards like him prevented "the escape, revolt and release of prisoners" between August 1944 and April 1945, according to the prosecutor's letter. He is accused of having contributed to the "equipment of the killing machine", knowing all the circumstances.

The former guard was working in the Stutthof concentration camp, opened by the Nazis in northern Poland. In this city, 65,000 people died – about half of them were Jewish – between 1939 and 1945, when it was the first field built outside Germany. The prosecutor's office said that about 200 prisoners were gassed at the Zyklon-B, 30 prisoners were shot in the neck and others, "creating and maintaining conditions of life in danger", that is to say -say fruit of food deprivation and denial medical care for the sick.

On Friday, the second day of the trial, Dey had to face her past again. A police expert appeared in the room to certify that the crematorium could be seen from some watchtowers. Police also presented testimonials from other guardswho even claimed to be able to appreciate the smell emanating from the crematorium. And that sometimes they also saw executions. The defendant is supposed to answer the questions opened by this trial, divided into two-hour sessions, which will be held twice a week. In total, there will be 11 sessions, which will last until mid-December and during which it is planned to also testify survivors. The verdict is expected by the end of the year.

The accused's lawyer, Stefan Waterkamp, ​​assured in his inaugural speech that the SS (Nazi regime's political police) guard did not volunteer to work in the field, He was recruited and could not resist. In his speech to the judge, he also stated that his past was never a secret and that he had already been questioned by prosecutors in the seventies and eighties. "No one in Germany has been interested for 70 years in a simple guard who has committed no crime. Justice has failed to judge the Nazi past and now they are trying to make up for lost time, "he summed up.

The case is accompanied by a series of precedents that have marked a change of jurisprudence and that allowed decades later to judge people who were not directly involved in the crimes with which they were related and who were doing so. part of the lowest rank of the Main Nazi chain. In March 2018, Oskar Gröning, better known as an accountant in Auschwitz, passed away. convicted by the German courts confirming the legal precedent established in the trial against John Demjanjuk, guard of Sobibor camp, in occupied Poland. In this 2011 process, in which a guard was sentenced to five years in prison, it was established that to be part of the Nazi machinery was enough to be doomed. Until then, only senior officials or material executors of the crimes were held responsible. Demjanjuk died in 2012, before completing his process.

Cornelius Nestler, one of the victims' lawyers, says that "at Stutthof, mass crimes were committed by the SS and that this was made possible by the guards; the accused assured that no one could escape this hell. He also tells the story of his defender, Judy Meisel, that the last time she saw her mother was naked and at the entrance of the shower where he would be gassed.

Christoph Rückel, another victim's lawyer, thinks of the door of the courtroom that no matter how much they condemn him will not end up in jail Because of his age. "But this lawsuit is very important for the victims, it's a relief on which Germany is investigating," he said.

The trial also takes place barely a week after an anti-Semitic attack in Halle that shocked Germany and which the judge herself remembered at the opening of the trial. "Halle is a strong reminder of where anti-Semitism leads usEfraim Zuroff, director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, enters the room before entering, but also attends the proceedings and categorically rejects the arguments of the defense.

"They want German justice to be judged in order to dilute their own crimes," he thinks. Zuroff, a reference in the persecution of former Nazis, believes that "outside the decision,"this case is very important because it shows the atrocities committed to the new generations and the Holocaust deniers and sends the message that no matter how much time passes, you are never safe from justice. The passage of time does not reduce guilt, "he says. Zuroff and the others agree that in Hamburg, Dey and the atrocities of the Nazi regime are judged, but fearing a gift, I can end up imitating the past.