A German court on Tuesday sentenced Joseph Sitz, a 101-year-old former security guard at the Saxonyhausen concentration camp who has been convicted of involvement in war crimes during the Holocaust, to five years in prison.
Schitz worked as a security guard at the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in Oranienburg from 1942 to 1945.
The court found him complicit in the murder of several thousand prisoners.
Schitz, who currently lives in the state of Brandenburg, pleaded guilty to the charges against him. He claimed that he had done nothing and was unaware of the horrific crimes committed in the camp.
“I don’t know why I’m here,” the defendant said at the end of the trial on Monday.
However, prosecutors emphasized that he had knowingly and voluntarily participated in the murder of 3,518 people and demanded that he be sentenced to five years in prison.
Between 1936 and the end of World War II, more than 200,000 prisoners visited the Sachsenen concentration camp in 1945. Among them were opponents of the Nazi regime, as well as Jews and gypsies.
Tens of thousands of prisoners died as a result of hard forced labor, were murdered, killed in medical experiments, died of starvation or died of disease.
The prosecutor’s office claimed that Schitz had helped execute the Soviet prisoners of war in 1942 and helped poison the prisoners with Zyklon B gas.
Shicam was 21 at the time.
During the lawsuit, Shitz made contradictory statements about his past, saying that there was a mess in his head.
In one lawsuit, the centenarian claimed to have worked as a farm worker in Germany for most of World War II. However, a number of historical documents mentioning his name, place and date of birth dispute this assertion.
After the war, Schitz was transferred to a prison camp in Russia, but then returned to Germany, where he worked as a locksmith and engaged in agriculture.
Schitz was at large during the trial. The lawsuit began in 2021, but was postponed several times due to Shitz’s health.
Despite his sentencing, Shitz is unlikely to end up in prison due to his respectable age.
His lawyer told AFP before reading the verdict that Schitz would appeal if convicted.
More than 70 years have passed since World War II, and German prosecutors are less and less able to prosecute those responsible for the crimes of the Nazi regime.
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