A former secretary of the Stutthof concentration camp has been sentenced to two years in prison. The 97-year-old Irmgard Furchner was a typist in the concentration camp near Gdańsk from 1943 to 1945. It is one of the latest convictions in a series of lawsuits filed by Germany against war criminals.
Furchner was convicted of complicity in the murder of more than 11,000 people. A total of more than 60,000 people were murdered in Stutthof concentration camp between 1939 and 1945. As a typist, aged 18 and 19 at the time, she transcribed the execution orders dictated to her by the camp commander. Her position was “essential in the camp system,” prosecutor Maxi Wantzen said at the trial. The camp was able to “continue to function thanks to her.”
At the start of her trial in September 2021, Furchner’s chair initially remained empty. In an attempt to flee from the trial, she had left her home early in the morning and ordered a taxi to a subway station. She was arrested a few hours later, after which the trial could still begin.
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The ruling is one of the latest in a series of lawsuits that Germany is conducting 77 years later in the northern German town of Itzehoe against war criminals in World War II. In practice, very old convicts rarely actually go to jail due to poor health or premature death. But don’t call things symbolic, prosecutor Thomas Will told earlier NRC. “According to the German court, murder simply does not have a statute of limitations, and persons who have committed themselves must be prosecuted, regardless of their age.”