The greatest mass trial of World War II war criminals will open shortly when 700 guards, block captains and other minor officials of the Oswie him death camp face a court here on charges of having participated in the murder of 1,500,000 Jews and hundreds of thousands of other persons.
The bill of indictment totals 15,000 pages and relates in detail the barbarities perpetrated at the camp and the extent to which many of the officials personally profited from its operations. The proceedings will be carried on in Polish, Russian, English, French and German. Since it was impossible to find attorneys willing to defend the accused, the government will appoint defense counsel.
Forty top officials of the Oswiecim installation, including a former command-and, head of the women’s section and several doctors, will go on trial in Cracow on Nov. 24. In other actions against war criminals recently, a circuit court here sentenced to death Guenther Plokonhagen, a member of the S.S. Viking Division, which participated in the liquidation of the Warsaw Ghetto. Pickenhagen was charged with personally murdering a three-year-old child. In Danzig, a court meted out death sentences to 10 officials of the Stutthof Camp and sentenced 16 others to prison terms ranging from eight to 15 years.
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