Dutch war criminal Siert Bruins, 57, who had been sentenced in his absence to death for war crimes by a Dutch special tribunal in 1949 and who had been living under an assumed name in Westphalia in West Germany, was arrested Tuesday in Hagen, West Germany at the request of the Dutch authorities. Holland will ask West Germany for his extradition. Bruins joined the German frontier police which was part of the German security service.
On April 25, 1945, a few days before the liberation, he personally killed two Jewish brothers, Lazar and Meyer Sleutelberg, who had been hiding in the area. He also committed many other murders, according to charges. During the chaotic conditions following the liberation he managed to escape to Germany and settled in a village near Hagen.
The West German and Dutch authorities were warned of Bruins’ whereabouts by Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal who, in turn, had been tipped by a journalist from the Dutch northeastern province of Groningen. Wiesenthal after six months of searching, found his address. Because more than 25 years have elapsed since the death sentence of 1949 the sentence can no longer be imposed but must be changed into life imprisonment.
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