The court at Bielefeid has ordered the release from prison of Lothar Heimbach, 59, who was convicted last April of mass murder and sentenced to nine years at hard labor and five years’ loss of civil rights. Heimbach’s crimes were committed while he was chief of the Gestapo, the Nazi secret police, in Bialystok, Poland, during World War II.
Heimbach’s release from Bielefeld prison followed that of two other convicted war criminals. The court explained the leniency shown Heimbach by asserting that he had spent four years in an interrogation jail awaiting trial and that, since the two others had been freed, he was entitled to equal treatment under the law.
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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.
