The State Prosecutor has dismissed charges against Kurt Becher, a Bremen grain merchant and former SS officer accused of complicity in the mass murders of Jews and other atrocities during World War II.
Becher, said to have been a confidant of SS chief Heinrich Himmler, was slated to go on trial after charges against him by a local journalist triggered a public demand for an official investigation. Last summer he resigned as a member of the board of directors of Hapag-Lloyd, the giant West German shipping company.
But the prosecutor found that similar charges against Becher had been investigated twice in Munich between 1965-70 and in each case there was insufficient evidence to bring him to trial.
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.
