A second defendant among the 14 former SS officers on trial here for slaughtering 70,000 persons in White Russia in 1941, including at least 30,000 Jews, conceded guilt before the court here today. Rudolf Schlegel, one of the few among the accused who had not been in the West German police forces, told the judge and jury: “I was stationed at the ditch, and also shot. ” He referred to a large excavation where many Jews, Russians and Gypsies were forced to lie down for execution by the Nazi squads.
Previously, the leader of the group, Georg Heuser, head of the Criminal Investigation Department in the West German State of Rhineland-Palatinate, until his arrest over two years ago, had told the court he was at least “partly guilty. ” Schlegel is accused in the indictment specifically of the murder of 5,280 persons curing the massacre.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
