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alp227

(32,058 posts)
Sat Sep 22, 2012, 03:06 AM Sep 2012

Hunt Ends for a Nazi Now Believed to Be Dead

Source: NY Times

The hunt for Aribert Ferdinand Heim, a Nazi fugitive and concentration camp doctor, has officially come to a close, the German authorities said Friday, after they determined that the man known as Dr. Death for his unnecessary operations had died in Egypt in 1992.

A regional court in Baden-Baden, Dr. Heim’s last known residence in Germany, said it had suspended the criminal investigation because “no doubts remained” that the fugitive who eluded the authorities for decades had died of cancer in Cairo in 1992.

The New York Times and the German television station ZDF reported in 2009 that Dr. Heim had escaped justice by hiding in North Africa. An old, dusty briefcase full of letters, handwritten notes about the case against him and medical records corroborated the accounts of Egyptians who knew him there.

Investigators established that the documents were real and had belonged to Dr. Heim but could not prove conclusively that he was dead. Witnesses said he had died after a long struggle with rectal cancer. At the same time, they said he had been buried in a common grave, meaning that nearly 20 years on, neither DNA nor dental records could be used to confirm his death.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/22/world/europe/germany-ends-hunt-for-nazi-dr-death.html

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Hunt Ends for a Nazi Now Believed to Be Dead (Original Post) alp227 Sep 2012 OP
Good SIDURI Sep 2012 #1
Wikipedia says he was born in 1914. LeftyMom Sep 2012 #2
Odd as it may seem, 98-year-olds exist. (nt) Posteritatis Sep 2012 #5
They're rarer than hen's teeth. LeftyMom Sep 2012 #8
Uncovering Lost Path of the Most Wanted Nazi (NYT Feb 2009) struggle4progress Sep 2012 #3
Fictional movie about Dr. Death saidsimplesimon Sep 2012 #7
I believe the movie you are refering to HeiressofBickworth Sep 2012 #10
"...long term battle with rectal cancer...." So he didn't get off completely. I hope it was real ... marble falls Sep 2012 #4
If I actually believed in an afterlife.... Socal31 Sep 2012 #6
works after WW2 LilSol Sep 2012 #9

LeftyMom

(49,212 posts)
2. Wikipedia says he was born in 1914.
Sat Sep 22, 2012, 03:23 AM
Sep 2012

It shouldn't have taken an investigation to figure out he was dead, when simple math would do.

struggle4progress

(118,356 posts)
3. Uncovering Lost Path of the Most Wanted Nazi (NYT Feb 2009)
Sat Sep 22, 2012, 04:10 AM
Sep 2012

By SOUAD MEKHENNET and NICHOLAS KULISH
Published: February 4, 2009

... A dusty briefcase with rusted buckles, sitting nearly forgotten in storage here in Cairo, hid the truth behind Dr. Heim’s flight to the Middle East. Obtained by The New York Times and the German television station ZDF from members of the Doma family, proprietors of the hotel here where Dr. Heim resided, the files in the briefcase tell the story of his life, and death, in Egypt.

The briefcase contains an archive of yellowed pages, some in envelopes that were still sealed, of Dr. Heim’s letters and medical test results, his financial records and an underlined, annotated article from a German magazine about his own manhunt and trial in absentia, even drawings of soldiers and trains by the children he left behind in Germany. Some documents are in the name Heim, others Farid, but many of the latter, like an application for Egyptian residency under the name Tarek Hussein Farid, have the same birthday, June 28, 1914, and the same place of birth, Radkersburg, Austria, as Dr. Heim.

Although none of the 10 friends and acquaintances in Cairo who identified a photograph of Dr. Heim knew his real identity, they described signs that he might have been on the run. “My idea, which I’ve taken from my father at that time, is that he was in dispute with maybe the Jews, but he took refuge in Cairo at that time,” said Tarek Abdelmoneim el Rifai, the son of Abdelmoneim el Rifai, 88, Dr. Heim’s dentist in Cairo and close friend.

A certified copy of a death certificate obtained from Egyptian authorities confirmed witness accounts that the man called Tarek Hussein Farid died in 1992. “Tarek Hussein Farid is the name my father took when he converted to Islam,” said his son Rüdiger Heim. In an interview in the family’s villa in Baden-Baden, Mr. Heim, 53, admitted publicly for the first time that he was with his father in Egypt at the time of his death from rectal cancer ...


http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/05/world/africa/05nazi.html?pagewanted=all

saidsimplesimon

(7,888 posts)
7. Fictional movie about Dr. Death
Sat Sep 22, 2012, 04:10 PM
Sep 2012

Helen Mirren, Oscar winner, Dame of the British Empire, was the star of a film about this. I can't find any internet reference. It's, no doubt, out of an abundance of caution.

I admire her work and hope to see her on the English stage.

As for Dr. Death, it galls me that psychopaths with money and influence escape justice.

marble falls

(57,250 posts)
4. "...long term battle with rectal cancer...." So he didn't get off completely. I hope it was real ...
Sat Sep 22, 2012, 02:58 PM
Sep 2012

long term.

Socal31

(2,484 posts)
6. If I actually believed in an afterlife....
Sat Sep 22, 2012, 03:39 PM
Sep 2012

I would know that there is a special place in hell for the Nazi "doctors", as well as the Japanese Unit 731 devils.

Sadly the Nazis continued to ruin lives after WWII with Thalidomide.

 

LilSol

(50 posts)
9. works after WW2
Sat Sep 22, 2012, 06:33 PM
Sep 2012

He worked after worldwar II in Germany as gynecologist and nobody asked what he did in ww2 time...

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