Martin Fellenz, a former SS major convicted of murdering 40, 000 Jews in the Krakow area in 1942, was released yesterday after a Jury found him guilty and the court had sentenced him to four years’ imprisonment at hard labor.
It was explained that Fellenz had already served 30 months’ imprisonment while awaiting trial, and that it is expected that the remainder of his sentence will be “served” under probation. When he was arrested for his war crimes, Fellenz was a town councillor in Schleswig, and a member of the United European Movement.
The trial, which lasted several weeks, attracted nationwide attention throughout Germany with crowds of spectators, including schoolchildren and their teachers, attending many of the court sessions. The 53-year-old Schleswig businessman was charged with having directed the removal of Jews from five Polish towns in the Krakow area to places where they were immediately shot or sent to death camps. In testifying on the killings, one witness told the court that “only another Dante could describe what happened.”
A number of Jewish witnesses from the United States and Israel–all former victims of Fellenz–were among the several dozen of witnesses who testified at the trial. They graphically described torture, screams, shots and dead bodies before the three Judges and the six Jurors.
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.
