89-yr-old held for aiding Nazi crimes

BY A STAFF WRITER

An 89-year-old Philadelphia man has been ordered held without bail after his arrest on charges of aiding and abetting the deaths of 216,000 Jewish men, women, and children during his time as a guard at the notorious Nazi death camp Auschwitz.

Johann “Hans” Breyer, a retired toolmaker, has been arrested outside his home in Northeast Philadelphia. He spent the night in custody and appeared frail during a detention hearing in federal court, wearing an olive green prison jumpsuit and carrying a cane.

Each count represents a trainload of Nazi prisoners from Hungary, Germany and Czechoslovakia who were killed at Auschwitz-Birkenau between May 1944 and October 1944, the documents said.

“There was a heightened execution of Jewish deportees brought to the camp,” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrea Foulkes. “Most of them were women, children and people with illness.”

Prosecutors say that Breyer, 18 at the time, served in the so-called Death’s Head Guard Battalion at the camp.

Attorney Dennis Boyle argued his client is too infirm to be detained pending a hearing on his possible extradition to Germany. Breyer has mild dementia and heart issues and has previously suffered strokes, Boyle said.

“Mr. Breyer is not a threat to anyone,” said Boyle. “He’s not a flight risk.”

But Magistrate Judge Timothy Rice ruled the detention center was equipped to care for Breyer, who appeared to comprehend questions about the nature of the hearing.

Breyer has admitted he was a guard at Auschwitz in occupied Poland during World War II, but he claims he was stationed outside of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp part of the complex and had nothing to do with the wholesale slaughter of about 1.5 million Jews and others behind the gates.

Thomas Walther, a former federal prosecutor with the special office that investigates Nazi war crimes in Germany, now represents family members of some of Breyer’s alleged victims as co-plaintiffs in the case. He called for a speedy extradition.

“The German court has to find late justice for the crimes of Breyer and for the victims and their sons and daughters as co-plaintiffs,” says Walther. “It is late, but not too late.”

Prosecutors in Weiden could not be reached for comment Wednesday. Their investigation comes after years of failed U.S. efforts to have Breyer stripped of his American citizenship and deported.

A court ruling in 2003 allowed him to stay in the United States, mainly on the grounds that he had joined the SS as a minor and could therefore not be held legally responsible for participation in it. His American citizenship stems from the fact his mother was born in the US.; she later moved to Europe, where Breyer was born.

During Breyer’s arrest last week, he asked the marshals to retrieve papers in his home that document his right to stay in the US.

Breyer’s wife and two grandsons attended the hour-long hearing in Philadelphia..His extradition hearing was scheduled for August 21.