Two of Adolf Eichmann’s principal aides in the deportation of 450,000 Hungarian Jews told the court trying them for mass murder yesterday that they had neither hurt nor robbed any of the Jews in their charge. The defendants are former SS Lieutenant-Colonel Herman Krumey and former Col. Otto Hunsche, who was Eichmann’s legal expert.
Weeping with pity for himself, Krumey said: “I never hurt a single soul. I never knew that deporting Jews meant their destruction. When Eichmann gave me to understand they were massacred, I didn’t know whether he was bluffing or not. Eichmann told me I was doing badly with the Jews in Hungary so I was sent to Vienna where I supervised the forced labor of Jews in Austria. I don’t feel guilty. I never took part in the destruction of Jews.”
Hunsche told the court he was “just a religious law student” and that he had been depressed when he failed in an examination for a judgeship. He then received an offer from Gestapo chief Heinrich Himmler to join the Gestapo. Both defendants denied robbing Jews. However, under cross-examination, Hunsche admitted “picking up a suitcase full of money.”
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