BERLIN — The lawyer for a 92-year-old former Waffen SS member charged with killing a Dutch resistance fighter in 1944 asked a German court Monday to find his client not guilty.
Dutch-born Siert Bruins, now a German citizen, went on trial in September in the western city of Hagen. He is accused of killing resistance fighter Aldert Klaas Dijkema in September 1944 in Appingedam, near the German border in the northern Netherlands.
Bruins’s lawyer said in closing arguments Monday that his client didn’t know of plans to shoot Dijkema and that another now-deceased SS man pulled the trigger, said court spokesman Jan Schulte. The killing happened at a time when Allied forces had entered the Netherlands and were pushing back the occupying German troops.
German prosecutors and Dijkema’s sister have asked the court to hand Bruins a life sentence. Under German law, victims or their relatives can be plaintiffs in serious criminal cases.
The court will issue its verdict on Wednesday, Schulte said.
Get The Times of Israel's Daily Edition
by email and never miss our top stories
By signing up, you agree to the
terms
Copyright 2014 The Associated Press.
Help us report truthfully on social media
As a multimedia journalist, my job is to take the quality, fact-based journalism produced by The Times of Israel newsroom and make it accessible across every platform — from Instagram posts to podcasts to short-form videos.
This is how many, especially young people, consume news these days. But misinformation is rampant on social media. Our team at ToI produces accurate, responsible short-form reporting on Israel and the Jewish world.
If you believe in the importance of factual social media journalism, please consider joining our reader support group, The Times of Israel Community. Your financial support is essential to sustain responsible multimedia reporting.
— Gabriella Jacobs, multimedia journalist
Support our work
Support our work
Already a member? Sign in to stop seeing this
You're a dedicated reader
We’re really pleased that you’ve read X Times of Israel articles in the past month.
That’s why we started the Times of Israel - to provide discerning readers like you with must-read coverage of Israel and the Jewish world.
So now we have a request. Unlike other news outlets, we haven’t put up a paywall. But as the journalism we do is costly, we invite readers for whom The Times of Israel has become important to help support our work by joining The Times of Israel Community.
For as little as $6 a month you can help support our quality journalism while enjoying The Times of Israel AD-FREE, as well as accessing exclusive content available only to Times of Israel Community members.
Thank you,
David Horovitz, Founding Editor of The Times of Israel
Join Our Community
Join Our Community
Already a member? Sign in to stop seeing this
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on Google
