Prosecutors seek prison for ‘Bookkeeper of Auschwitz’

German prosecutors said Tuesday they were seeking three and a half years’ jail for a former SS officer known as the “Bookkeeper of Auschwitz” in closing arguments at his historic trial. Oskar Groening, 94, stands accused before a court in the northern city of Lueneburg of 300,000 counts of accessory to murder in the cases of deported Hungarian Jews sent to the gas chambers between May and July 1944. Public prosecutor Jens Lehmann said in closing arguments that his sentencing request was based on the “nearly incomprehensible number of victims” but mitigated by “the limited contribution of the accused” to their deaths. Lehmann also argued that the court should consider viewing some of the sentence as already served because Groening had been repeatedly investigated since the 1970s with no charges brought until last year.

I can only ask my God for forgiveness.

Oskar Groening

Groening’s trial, expected to be one of the last of its kind, began in April. He served as a bookkeeper at Auschwitz, sorting and counting the money taken from those killed or used as slave labor, collecting cash in different European currencies and shipping it back to his Nazi bosses in Berlin. The prosecution assumes that on at least three occasions, Groening performed “ramp duty,” processing deportees as they arrived by rail at the extermination and forced labor camp in Nazi-occupied Poland. Groening, whose frail health has led to several delays in the proceedings, has acknowledged “moral guilt” but said it is up to the court to rule on his legal culpability. Lehmann said the court faced a historic decision with its verdict, which could come as early as this month.