Former Nazi SS hit man goes on trial in Aachen - Germany

One of Germany's last Nazi war crime trials began on Wednesday in Aachen against 88-year-old Heinrich Boere, a Dutch-born former SS hit man accused of killing three of his countrymen.

Boere allegedly shot and killed three resistance fighters in the Nazi occupied Netherlands in 1944. A Dutch court sentenced him to death in absentia for the crime some 60 years ago, but the ruling was later changed to a lifelong prison sentence.

Boere never served the sentence, fleeing to Germany in 1947. Authorities between the Netherlands and Germany have been bickering about his fate ever since.

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Isn't killing the opposition what people are supposed to do in a war?

yes.

No if you lose the war.

Very little information on that story.

He killed 3 people who were accused of being resistance fighters/terrorists.

Seems on the surface to be much the same sort of thing that happens today when some terrorist leader is the object of a targetted killing.

angelbeast is right - don't lose.

According to the BBC...

Heinrich Boere is charged with killing three men: Fritz Bicknese, a chemist and father of 12; bicycle seller Teun de Groot, who helped Jews go into hiding; and resistance member Frans Kusters.

This was not in battle, it was a cold blooded murder of prisoners.

Do you suppose just for one moment that these three people were the only ones that this Nazi Hit Man killed?

Doesn't actually say that his victims were prisoners.

He may have just walked up to them in the street and shot them dead. We don't have enough information to really tell.

I doubt that myself.

I actually heard about this story today on the news in the car.. Sounded a bit like some bored lawyer was looking to make a name for himself.. What better publicity stunt than bringing an 88-year old boogey-man to "justice"?...

@ HerrDinksbumps
Your anti-semitism and lack of reasoning based on facts is noted. I assume you support committing war crimes.
He shot 3 unarmed people without trial. He is a criminal in my opinion.
However if he did not shoot them, the sentence in the German army was beheading with an axe for failing to carry out standing orders. I assume that will be taken into account in his trial.
What needs to be known is if they were actual combatants or just innocent civilians killed at random. Killers of innocent civilians is a clear cut case of war crimes. Killers of people who were involved in attacks is not clear cut, no matter what side they were on.
In that war all sides committed war crimes.
A LOT more nazi doctors who ran killing hospitals should have been tried and hung, but they were not. People in propaganda should not even have been tried.
If all was fair a lot of people on the allied side would have been tried as well, but were not, such as Bomber Harris. unfortunately it is the victor who decides who is tried after a war. The choice of who is tried is not independant.

The only war criminals are the ones on the losing side. I agree that criminals such as this should be brought to justice, but why stop there. Winston Churchill was also a war criminal who should have been tried and sent to prison for his ordering the bombing of Dresden.

Don't worry for him. If his lawyers are any good they just have to say it was a time of war and he had to kill these three victims to defend his his country's honor. Is that not what Churchill did in Dresden to the 125,000 defenceless civilians? Is that not what the Americans have done for the last 6 years,and not even on their own soil, but in Iraq to the Iraqi civilians? Now that's war criminals.

Are you implying that the case is not based on facts or that whatever he did were most certainly not war crimes or that murder charges should be suspended because the guy is old?

Cause a discussion of technicalities would be most interesting, but the general principle of Nazi crimes is nothing something I'd consider a "boogey-man" nor should old age be grounds of excemption from justice.

Naziism is indeed a (no, THE..) big boogey-man in our whole moral consciousness. Think about it - he was a Nazi, doing his job. As was stated above, the Nazis lost, and so this guy is getting sucked up in the demonization, still going on 60 years later..

We have been brainwashed to believe that Naziism is the ABSOLUTELY worst thing imagineable ever.. Where are all the cases of lawyers going out to make names for themselves by prosecuting Stalin's henchmen? Or did Stalin personally kill all 30-50 million people whose deaths he is supposedly responsible for?

I read a great article in the New York Review of Books recently, about a play being staged in New York. In it, Stalin is portrayed in a positive light. Stalin is responsible for more dead Ukrainians than Hitler is for dead Jews, but NEVER - NEVER would there EVER be a play portraying Hitler in any kind of positive light.. Forget positive - there's an uproar if he's even portrayed as a human being, and not some monster incarnation of ultimate evil.

I'm not saying we should have plays glorifying Hitler btw. I'm just saying that our moral system is rather contingent. And IMO, based on what I've read and heard about this case, this old man is being hounded down in its name.

According to the story he shot three resistance fightgers. So we're not talking about the guys shoving Jews in ovens and doing warped medical experiments - but a soldier doing his job in wartime - apparently...

It's hard not to be cynical when this kind of thing comes up in the media.. It attracts oohs and ahhs, sells press space, and reaffirms our contingent moral convictions.. It's pathetic..

As was shown in your previous offensive and anti-semitic comment, which was thankfully removed, you obviously have an alternative motive.

I have not been "brainwashed" into believing that Naziism is an evil and terrible thing, I have heard witness testimony and seen video footage that has lead me to draw that conclusion for myself. Yes he was a Nazi doing his job, which is precisely why the scumbag is being tried for his crimes.

I saw your previous comment, which indicates that you somehow approve of the Nazis and their treatment of Jews, therefor I will have nothing further to do with this post while you are a contributor to it.