German authorities have expressed a desire to stop the prosecution of an elderly SS medic who served in the Auschwitz concentration camp that they say is unfit to stand trial.
According to the Associated Press, prosecutors have stated that Hubert Zafke, a 97-year-old former SS medic who was charged with 3,681 counts of accessory two years ago, is no longer fit enough for a fair trial following extensive delays in his case. Earlier this year three judges who were responsible for these delays were removed after being accused of bias.
The latest development in the Zafke case comes weeks after Oskar Groening, a 96-year-old former Auschwitz guard, was found fit for incarceration, two years after being sentenced to a four-year jail term.
Groening was sentenced to four years in prison in 2015 for his role in murdering hundreds of thousands of Jews while serving as a guard at the Nazi concentration camp.
Known as the "accountant of Auschwitz,” Groening has admitted to gathering the property of Jews who had been murdered at the camp. He has previously stated that "there is no question that I made myself morally complicit.”
Groening’s conviction was made possible by the 2011 conviction in Munich of Sobibor guard Ivan Demjanju, who was the first convicted in Germany for service in a concentration camp without “proof of a specific crime against a specific victim.” After the Demjanjuk, merely proving service in a camp became sufficient for a conviction.
