We want truth, say survivors as ex-ss guard goes on trial

A FORMER SS guard went on trial in Germany yesterday over the deaths of hundreds of Jewish and Polish prisoners during the Second World War.

In what may prove to be the final Holocaust trial, Johann Rehbogen, 94, is accused of being an accessary in the murders of prisoners at Stutthof concentration camp, in modern Poland.

Dr Rehbogen has admitted that he served as an SS guard at the concentration camp but denies knowing anything of what went on inside.

There are no pleas in the German legal system, but Dr Rehbogen’s lawyer said his client intended to make a statement at some point during the trial.

The 94-year-old entered the courtroom in the German city of Münster and wept as the charges against him were read.

As he was aged 18 to 20 at the time of the alleged crimes, he is being tried under the country’s juvenile court system. Because of his age and frailty, the trial has been limited to two-hour sessions twice a week.

More than 65,000 prisoners are believed to have been murdered at Stutthof concentration camp, close to the Polish city of Gdansk, then known as Danzig.

Although Stutthof was not an extermination camp like Auschwitz, thousands of prisoners were killed there. A gas chamber was built in 1944 and many prisoners were killed with injections of phenol to the heart. Among the dead were more than 28,000 Jewish prisoners.

Prosecutors argue that by serving as a guard he was an accessary to the murders of hundreds of Polish and Jewish prisoners between June 1942 and September 1944.

His trial is the latest in an effort to bring surviving perpetrators to justice while there is still time.

In 2015, Oskar Gröning, the 94-yearold “bookkeeper of Auschwitz”, was found guilty on 300,000 charges of being an accessary to murder. Reinhold Hanning, 95, a former SS guard at the extermination camp, was convicted on similar charges last year. Both died before they could begin their sentences.

A case against Hubert Zafke, 96, a former SS medic at Auschwitz, was abandoned last year after he was ruled too unwell to stand trial. Seventeen survivors of Stutthof concentration camp are taking part in the trial of Dr Rehbogen as co-plaintiffs.

“My clients are not concerned whether this elderly defendant goes to prison,” Onur Özata, a lawyer, said. “They want him finally to tell the truth about the crimes that took place in Stutthof.”