Eberhard Engelhardt, a 75-year-old lawyer, was fined 1500 Marks by a Nuremberg court today for threatening to bring legal action against a German Jewish journalism who mentioned on a television program that members of her family died in the Holocaust. Engelhardt, who practices in Nuremberg, was found guilty of exercising duress.
The incident occurred during a panel discussion which followed the screening of the American TV series “Holocaust” in West Germany last year. One of the panelists, Renate Harprecht of Hamburg, noted that several members of her family perished in the Nazi gas chambers. A former SS official on the panel demanded to know precisely where and when the murders took place and whether she could prove them beyond doubt. Engelhardt, who represented the ex-SS man, warned Harprecht that unless she provided a satisfactory reply within a fixed period of time he would take her to court for insulting the German people and instigating against them.
Harprecht informed the police and the State Prosecutor subsequently brought charges against the lawyer. After the court’s verdict was announced, the Prosecutor said that the lawyers association would seek to bring Engelhardt before a court of honor to answer for his actions.
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