101-year-old former Nazi concentration camp guard sentenced to 5 years for Holocaust crimes

BERLIN — A 101-year-old former Nazi concentration camp guard was sentenced Tuesday to five years in prison for Holocaust crimes.

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According to the Associated Press, a 101-year-old man was convicted in Germany of over 3,500 counts of “accessory to murder.” He was sentenced to five years in prison.

The man, German media identified as Josef S., served at the Nazis’ Sachsenhausen concentration camp during World War II, according to the AP. Josef S. denied working as a Nazis guard at the camp where he aided in murdering thousands of prisoners.

The AP said that the trial began last October. It was told that he worked as a farm laborer in northeastern Germany during the war but it was proved that he worked at Sachsenhausen concentration camp near Berlin between 1942 and 1945. According to the AP per the German news outlet dpa, he was a registered member of the Nazi Party’s paramilitary wing. There was also documentation that the prosecutors had gained access to that showed that Josef S. was an SS guard.

Judge Udo Lechtermann said, according to the AP, that by working in the concentration camp for the three years he contributed to the Nazi terror and murder.

Josef S. was sentenced to five years in prison based on the prosecution’s request. His defense attorney, according to the AP per dpa, is planning to appeal the verdict. The Central Council of Jews in Germany welcomed the ruling.

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