Bishop Richard Williamson, 72, a former leading member of the ultra-conservative Catholic breakaway group Society of St. Pius X (SSPX), has been fined €1,800 (US$ 2,400) by a court in Germany for downplaying the Holocaust and denying the existence of gas chambers in a Swedish TV interview conducted in Germany in November 2008. In the interview, he said that not more than "200,000 to 300,000 Jews perished in Nazi concentration camps".
Williamson was already convicted in 2009 under a German law that considers denial of the Holocaust as incitement to hatred, but the conviction was later overturned on procedural grounds. The case was retried in the Bavarian city of Regensburg on Wednesday, and the bishop was found guilty again. The prosecution had demanded a higher fine of €6,500 for Williamson, who was not present at the hearing, but the court lowered the amount as it judged Williamson had no income at present.
Williamson’s interview, broadcast in January 2009, caused outrage world-wide because it coincided with Pope Benedict's lifting of the excommunication on four SSPX bishops, including Williamson. The Englishman was dismissed from the SSPX in October 2012.
