New evidence of homicide at Nazi-era clinic

Two researchers today informed Austrian prosecutors of what they say is new evidence of homicide in a Nazi programme that killed hundreds of children at a Vienna clinic during the Second World War.

The documents, transcripts from Russian interrogation of a doctor in charge of the clinic, “contain descriptions of mass killings,” historian Florian Beierl said.

More than 700 children deemed by the Nazis to be physically, mentally or otherwise unfit to live were killed in the Am Spiegelgrund clinic, and thousands were exposed to cruel experiments.

In the documents, the clinic’s first director, Dr Erwin Jekelius, describes how six to 10 children a month were killed at the hospital, and how his doctors made up fake diagnoses as causes of death to give to the children’s parents, Beierl said.

Jekelius also says staff member Dr Heinrich Gross was an expert in killing children, and that he used poison to kill them, Beierl said. Jekelius died in a Soviet prison in 1952 while serving a 25-year-sentence for killing 4,000 civilians under the broader Nazi programme that included Am Spiegelgrund.

It was unclear whether the new findings would have any legal significance.

Gross – the only surviving Am Spiegelgrund official – has been put on trial three times, but two were dismissed, the first on legal technicalities, and the second because a statute of limitations on manslaughter had expired.

A third trial in 2000, in which Gross was accused of complicity in the deaths of nine handicapped children from abuse, was suspended after a psychiatrist testified he was unfit for trial because of advanced dementia.

Ernst Kloyber, a spokesman for the prosecutor’s office, said experts would study the documents handed in today by Beierl to see if they contained new evidence.

“But because Gross is not able to stand trial, it won’t change anything in practice,” he said.

The documents, nonetheless, shed more light on what happened at Am Spiegelgrund, said journalist Thomas Staehler, who along with Beierl found the transcripts while researching a television documentary.

“In any case, it is very important that what happened here is clarified and explored,” Staehler said in an interview after a news conference to announce the new findings.

The transcripts provide a chilling insight into Nazi-era views.

“Jekelius justified his actions by saying he totally agreed with Hitler’s policy of exterminating mentally ill people. He also said that his personal and professional view was that such people were a burden to their families and to society,” said an excerpt of the Russian document provided by Beierl.

Waltraud Haeupl, 70, whose 4-year-old sister was killed at Am Spiegelgrund in 1942, welcomed the new findings but said she wanted Gross to face justice.

“He is a mass murderer,” she said. “We have to put the facts on the table. Time is running out.”