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Trial against the Stutthof concentration camp secretary Irmgard Furchner: judge criticizes accessory charges

2021-10-26T15:44:12.298Z


The Itzehoe district court is hearing the case of the former concentration camp secretary Irmgard Furchner. The representatives of the bereaved are disturbed by the judge's actions - and fight back.


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Presiding judge Groß: The proceedings start stuttering

Photo: Marcus Brandt / picture alliance / dpa / dpa-Pool

Irmgard Furchner decided against a disguise.

An employee of the forensic medical service pushes the pensioner in a wheelchair to her seat in the specially built courtroom in the Itzehoe industrial park.

The 96-year-old wears a red beret, a red winter coat and sunglasses, not a veil like on the previous day of the trial.

The former secretary at the Stutthof concentration camp is charged with complicity in murder in 11,412 cases and in 18 other cases with complicity in attempted murder.

For public prosecutor Maxi Wantzen she had "partly in detail" knowledge of the crimes within the concentration camp when she worked as a typist for the camp commandant between June 1943 and April 1945.

65,000 people were murdered in Stutthof.

With Irmgard Furchner, a civil employee of one of the Nazi concentration camps is on trial for the first time.

It should be one of the last Nazi trials ever, a challenge for the presiding judge Dominik Groß, who still seems to be looking for his role in this historic trial.

Some co-plaintiffs criticize that he needs "tutoring."

He lacks sovereignty.

"Strange"

Many of them also represented survivors in the trial against former concentration camp guard Bruno Dey, who was convicted in Hamburg in July 2020. The Hamburg criminal chamber, chaired by Judge Anne Meier-Göring, tried sincerely at the time to establish the truth and achieve legal peace and carried out the proceedings in an exemplary manner from the start.

In Itzehoe, however, it starts stuttering. Because the proceedings are of "outstanding historical significance for the Federal Republic of Germany", the main hearing is recorded for scientific and historical purposes. However, only after Hans-Jürgen Förster had submitted a corresponding application. The lawyer from Lübeck is representing four survivors from Israel and Australia as joint plaintiffs in the proceedings. It is “strange”, says Förster, that the court did not allow tape recordings “ex officio”. In the Hamburg proceedings, no information about this was necessary.

At that time, the court also succeeded in exemplary fashion in respecting the dignity of everyone: that of the accused concentration camp security guard, but above all that of the co-plaintiffs.

They are not interested in revenge, nor in harsh judgment.

Their suffering is not diminished when a now very old former concentration camp secretary like Irmgard Furchner is sent to prison.

For them it is about determination, about remembering, about dunning.

At some point "not one single one of us will be there anymore and be able to report on what he or she once saw and experienced with his own eyes," wrote the Holocaust survivor Efraim Jessner in his book "From Darkness to Light".

"This process does not deserve that"

The conduct of the negotiations by chairman Groß, who begins the third day of the trial by rejecting the application of the Berlin lawyer Onur Özata, is all the more irritating.

The accessory prosecutor wanted to make an opening statement.

In terms of process technology, this is not provided, argues Groß.

Özata defends himself.

Other victim representatives stand behind him.

"If you cut us off, you cut off the victims' word," says Christoph Rückel, who represents six survivors in the proceedings as joint plaintiffs.

"This trial doesn't deserve that."

Big looks unwilling.

He wants to start taking evidence now, he says impatiently.

"They degrade us to extras," states Özata.

Groß denies this and calls the first witness in these proceedings: Stefan Hördler, historian from Göttingen.

He is considered an expert on Wehrmacht and SS structures and has written an expert opinion on behalf of the Itzehoe public prosecutor's office.

Does she understand the historian?

Hördler talks about the structure and organization of the concentration camp system and about the fact that an SS man initially had the status of an armed auxiliary police officer.

From 1936 there were the SS-Totenkopfverband, in whose center of power Paul-Werner Hoppe - Furchner's boss - rose in 1938.

For almost two years she was secretary in the headquarters of the Stutthof Hoppes concentration camp.

Irmgard Furchner follows Hördler's remarks with clasped hands on his mouth.

She does not look at the canvases on which documents appear, Hördler explains.

Your eyesight is severely impaired.

Does she even understand the historian?

Can she follow him?

Judge Gross doesn't ask her a single time.

Furchner's defense attorney, Wolf Molkentin, also has problems with the court's negotiation.

Hördler's lecture came too early.

“With the report, a comprehensive presentation and evaluation of the evidence is placed at the beginning, which could have a major impact on the further taking of evidence,” says Molkentin, “especially for lay judges, who do not know the file, but rather are completely impartial should make a picture of the course of the main hearing. "

When the appraiser has to hurry to the train station, Groß turns to the co-plaintiffs.

Özata does not give up.

The chairman could certainly grant a declaration of the secondary prosecution at the beginning of a main hearing.

"We are here because our clients cannot be here," says Özata.

"Without hearing the voice of the victims, justice cannot be done."

His colleague Mehmet Daimaguler sees the Chamber's decision as "disrespectful cheek" and cries out indignantly: "You have absolutely no interest in these people being heard."

"Defend"

A court case means clarification, says Rückel in a calm tone.

The chamber must hear those who have not been heard.

Obviously, the court does not understand what this means for the representatives of the co-plaintiffs: Giving people a voice who, after the experience, often no longer have the strength to speak about it.

Groß accepts the criticism soberly.

Prosecutor Wantzen tries to mediate.

There will be enough time to hear the accessory prosecution or make statements, she says.

The co-plaintiffs do not want to give up, on the contrary.

Rückel announces: "We will defend ourselves properly."

Source: spiegel

All life articles on 2021-10-26

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