If all the facts and figures that have come on the table in the last few weeks in this process were transformed into drops of water, for example, then you would be knee-deep in this courtroom in Brandenburg an der Havel Water. Only one person would remain completely dry, namely the defendant Josef S., who seems to be sitting in a diving bell, in any case the drops of fact ricochet off, and he sticks to his version of the truth on this Thursday too. It works like this: No, he was never in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. After he was resettled from Lithuania, he worked in agriculture all through the war, “clearing trees, planting trees”, growing sugar beets, never wearing a German uniform, never a weapon, but rather a “work suit.” In Kolberg in Western Pomerania he would have seen the Red Army march in. “Hands up!” I said there.
The explanation of Josef S., presented by his defense lawyer Stefan Waterkamp, had been awaited for a long time. Survivors sat here in the witness chair and needed a confession, sons of victims. With Josef S., however, hardly anything has moved, at least nothing that could have been seen from the outside. He turned 101 in mid-November. He is charged with aiding and abetting 3,518 murders in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Deeds that can be safely recorded for the period from October 1941 to the end of February 1945, during which Josef S. served there in six different companies of the SS Guard Battalion.
Thomas Walther, representative of many co-plaintiffs, speaks of the “escape into a dream world”, which also frees the defendant from “a heavy burden”.
On the 13th day of the trial, the presiding judge, Udo Lechtermann, can think of something that might help the defendant’s memory. He reads his 1985 pension application to the social security of the GDR. The life stages of the applicant Josef S. are handwritten on the back of one of the sheets. School, work in the family business, apprenticeship. For the period from 1940 to 1945 it says: “Military and war service”, i.e. not clearing and beet harvest. “I gather from this letter that you wrote it yourself,” says Lechtermann in a voice that tends to become uncomfortable.
“That was all already filled out by the women in the LPG,” says Josef S., all he had to do was sign. Yes, how did the women know all this, Lechtermann wants to know. “They jewusst everything, in black and white, everything was finished, what else I don’t know.”
The accused former concentration camp security guard comes into the courtroom with his lawyer Stefan Waterkamp (right), hidden from view.
(Photo: Fabian Sommer / dpa)
It is not entirely wrong that “they” knew everything, at least with regard to the State Security, which Josef S. ‘ Knew the past and tracked it down very carefully. The fact that he filled out the pension application with the life stations himself – it will probably not need a written expert.
And then it’s back to historian Stefan Hördler. He can even be in direct contact with Josef S. ‘ In the companies of the SS Guard Battalion Sachsenhausen, illuminate the superiors, men who were there with Josef S. at the same time. Josef S. speaks up, shakes his head, says “that everything is so twisted here”, “I don’t understand.”
Lechtermann is getting uncomfortable after all. “Now listen to the expert,” he admonished the defendant. “Yeah!” Says Josef S., “I’ll do it!” It sounds jagged, snappy, like booting. Like a shot from a pistol. It doesn’t sound like a saw, an ax or a beet knife.