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Defendant Irmgard Furchner was brought before a court in Itzehoe, Germany in December. The 97-year-old former secretary at a Nazi concentration camp during World War II was found guilty of more than 10,500 conspiracy to murder and given a two-year suspended sentence. Photo: Christian Charisius/EPA-EFE
December 20 (United Press International) — A Berlin court sentenced a 97-year-old woman to two years of probation on Tuesday for aiding and abetting the deaths of more than 10,500 people in Nazi concentration camps in the 1940s.
Imgard Fochner Serve as a Clerical Typist Between 1943 and 1945, many Jews were systematically murdered at the commandant’s office at the Stutthof concentration camp near Gdańsk in Nazi-occupied Poland.
During World War II, more than 100,000 people were housed at the Stutthof camp, of whom 65,000 eventually died there. The camp was known for its willful lack of care and abuse of prisoners, as well as its gas chambers and neck-shooting facilities.
Furchner’s immediate superior, camp commander Paul-Werner Hoppe, was imprisoned in 1955 for assisting in murder, but he was released five years later.
“I’m sorry for what happened and I regret that I was in Stutthof at the time,” Furchner told the court. “That’s all I can say.”
Furchner’s defense attorney argues There was no evidence that she knew about the systematic killings in the concentration camps, and prosecutors failed to prove she was criminally responsible.
Prosecutors and some survivors say she should be punished for directly assisting in the activities that led to the death.
“No one in their right mind would send a 97-year-old to prison, but the sentence should reflect the seriousness of the crime,” said Stutthof survivor Manfred Goldberg. How can someone convicted of 10,000 murders get the same sentence?”
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