Richard Hofmann (SS member)

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Richard Hofmann (born February 26, 1913 in Bechtheim ; † July 5, 1979 in Bonn ) was a German SS member , most recently with the rank of Oberscharführer , and a convicted Nazi murderer. He served in several concentration camps and was known for his sadistic behavior.

Life

Hoffmann was born on February 26, 1913 in Bechtheim near Worms. After attending primary school , he worked in his father's farm. At the age of 15 he joined the Hitler Youth and before 1933 became a member of the NSDAP and the SS. Werner Best appointed him in March 1933 as an auxiliary policeman for the Osthofen concentration camp . When the concentration camp was dissolved in 1934, he was first transferred to the Dachau guard and then to the Oranienburg concentration camp . In August 1936 he was transferred to the newly established Sachsenhausen concentration camp as a guard. In the summer or autumn of 1937 he was transferred to the headquarters staff. As a block leader and supervisor of various work details, he was feared as a man smuggler and a brutal thug. The prisoners gave him the nicknames: Ivan the Terrible, Chinese Karli or Roach. In the Oranienburg clinker factory area , he randomly hit people with clubs, shovel handles, shoulder straps and other tools. For a long time he led the clay pit work detachment, called "Hell in Hell" by the inmates and feared as a death detachment. There he beat an unknown French prisoner to death with a stake as thick as an arm in the second half of 1941. He was considered a "feared and brutal thug and human smuggler" and as "particularly cruel, insidious and sadistic". On September 1, 1942, he was transferred to the front and in 1943 was promoted to Oberscharführer.

In May 1945 he was taken prisoner of war in Yugoslavia . In the first years of the post-war period he lived undisturbed as a driver in Yugoslavia and Austria. There he married and lived in Feistritz in the Rosental . He was arrested on April 8, 1965 and extradited to the Federal Republic of Germany on June 2, 1965. On April 20, 1970, the Cologne Regional Court sentenced him to life imprisonment for fivefold murder and attempted murder. (AZ 24 Ks 2/68) In one of the cases documented to him from the summer of 1940 in the Tongrube satellite camp, he loosened the tipping device of a cart. The whole load of sand, about 3 tons, buried an unknown prisoner. Due to the long time span between the end of the war and its trials, further acts could not be clearly proven.

Hofmann died on July 5, 1979 in Bonn prison.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ In the service of the SS. Osthofen Concentration Camp Memorial , accessed on June 14, 2013 .
personal data
SURNAME Hofmann, Richard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German SS member and convicted murderer
DATE OF BIRTH February 26, 1913
PLACE OF BIRTH Bechtheim
DATE OF DEATH 5th July 1979
Place of death Bonn