AN SS guard dubbed the last Nazi after being tracked down by The Sun has escaped trial.
Gregor Formanek, 99, is accused of the “cruel and treacherous killing” of 3,300 people at Sachsenhausen concentration camp – where 100,000 prisoners died in all.
Simon Jones – Commissioned by The SunGregor Formanek is believed to be the last Nazi after being tracked down by The Sun[/caption]
BundesarchivThe 99-year-old is accused of helping to murder 3,300 people at the notorious WW2 prison Sachsenhausen[/caption]
UKTV- Abandoned EngineeringIt is estimated that a total of 100,000 people were killed at Sachsenhausen[/caption]
But despite being unveiled living independently with his wife in a £400,000 apartment near Frankfurt, a court has ruled him unfit to stand trial.
Previously healthy Formanek had been expected to become the last Nazi to face justice for the appalling crimes of the Holocaust.
Formanek, born in Romania, as the son of a German-speaking master tailor, joined the SS on July 4, 1943 and was a member of the Sachsenhausen guard battalion in Brandenburg.
Set up in 1936, the camp was seen as a training ground for Hitler’s mass extermination.
More than 200,000 prisoners passed through Sachsenhausen, notorious for its gas chambers and labs for horrifying medical experiments.
An incriminating document from the Main Personnel Office of the SS has confirmed Formanek’s chilling past.
The SS guard is said to have “supported the cruel and insidious killing of thousands of prisoners”.
At the end of the war Formanek was arrested by the Red Army and served just ten years behind bars before being released and working as a porter.
Dr Hans-Jürgen Förster, lawyer for the joint plaintiffs, told BILD: “We can lodge an appeal against the decision within a week. We will do that.”
The public prosecutor’s office in Giessen also intends to lodge an appeal.
A final decision will then be made by the Higher Regional Court in Frankfurt/Main.
Carmen Whitmore, 68, of Market Harborough, Leics., whose uncle, Great Escape pilot Jimmy James, was at Sachsenhausen – previously blasted: “Nazis need to be held accountable.”
Nazi-hunter Dr Efraim Zuroff, from The Simon Wiesenthal Centre, added that the old age doesn’t re-write Formanek’s crimes.
He noted that the former SS man enjoyed the luxury of living to a ripe age undetected – unlike those whose lives he didn’t spare.
He said: “Today is a very sad day for those of us who consider the prosecution of holocaust perpetrators very important.
“It leaves you with an empty feeling, very empty.
“We can only hope any kind of appeal is successful – but of course, the longer it goes on the greater the chance he will not live long enough – or stay strong enough – to face justice.
“From my perspective they are saying my mission is over – my mission for prosecutions.
“But the fight continues against the lies – about Holocaust distortion.”
Formanek pictured with his wife after living undetected in an unassuming suburb of Frankfurt
Paul PopperPrisoners clear snow at the Sachsenhausen camp in 1941[/caption]
GettySachsenhausen was notorious as a training ground for Hitler’s mass extermination[/caption]