Ex-Nazi guard guilty over 5,000 murders

93-year-old tried in youth court because he was 17 when stationed at concentration camp

A NAZI concentration camp guard was yesterday found guilty of taking part in 5,000 murders.

Bruno Dey, 93, was given a two-year suspended sentence at a youth court in Hamburg for his role as an SS guard at Stutthof when he was 17 and 18.

Dey was convicted of 5,232 counts of accessory to murder as part of the force manning the camp’s watchtowers between August 1944 and 1945.

He had denied being an accessory through preventing inmates from escaping and claimed working at the camp did not amount to guilt. He apologised for the suffering of the victims without explicitly taking responsibility.

He told the court: ‘Today, I want to apologise to all of the people who went through this hellish insanity.’

Dey said he had been ‘shaken’ by witness accounts but was not fully aware of the extent of the atrocities until the trial, which was held in a youth court because of his age at the time of the offences.

Presiding judge Anne MeierGoering had asked him: ‘How could you get used to the horror?’ She suggested Dey had refused to acknowledge his own role in the murders, adding: ‘You saw yourself as an observer.’

Prosecutors had called for a three-year sentence, arguing that Dey had contact with the prisoners and played an active role in stopping escapes.

Lars Mahnke, prosecuting, said: ‘When you are a part of mass-murder machinery, it is not enough to look away.’

The nine-month trial was told Dey had joined the SS in September 1944, having been sent to the camp as a Wehrmacht

‘Saw yourself as an observer’

soldier. This means he could have asked for a transfer to another unit instead of becoming part of the elite Nazi formation.

The defence appealed for a full acquittal, claiming he was a peripheral figure in the camp and not directly involved in the deaths.

The Germans converted Stutthof, located near modern-day Gdansk in Poland, into a concentration camp in 1942 and was one of the last to be liberated in May 1945. More than 65,000 prisoners are thought to have died there.

Dey’s age and wheelchairbound condition meant court sessions were limited to four hours a week in two separate sessions. Extra medical precautions were taken once the pandemic hit.