Alois Brunner

Alois Brunner (born April 8, 1912) is an Austrian Nazi war criminal who was Adolf Eichmann's assistant. He was a trouble-shooter for the Schutzstaffel deportations to Nazi concentration camps from Vichy France and, through his role in these deportations, he is considered a mass murderer due to his participation in the deaths of tens of thousands of Jews.

Related Topics:
April 8 - 1912 - Austrian - Nazi - War criminal - Adolf Eichmann - Schutzstaffel - Nazi concentration camps - Vichy France - Murder - Jew

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Brunner was born in Rohrbrunn, Austria. After the war he is said to have been employed by the CIA because he was fiercely anti-Soviet. He is then alleged to have fled to Syria, possibly in 1954, and hired as a "government advisor"—with some suggesting he was advising the Syrian dictatorship on torture and repression techniques.

Related Topics:
Rohrbrunn - Austria - CIA - Anti-Soviet - Syria - 1954 - Torture - Repression

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While unsuccessfully hunted by the late Simon Wiesenthal, he is believed to live in Damascus, Syria, under the alias "Dr. Georg Fischer." Germany and other countries have unsuccessfully requested his extradition. He was twice sentenced to death in absentia in the 1950s; one of those convictions was in France in 1954, when its death penalty was still in effect. In August 1987 an Interpol "red notice" (a sort of international arrest warrant) was issued for him. In 1995 German State prosecutors in Cologne and Frankfurt posted a US$333,000 reward for information leading to his arrest.

Related Topics:
Simon Wiesenthal - Damascus - Alias - In absentia - 1987 - Interpol - 1995 - US$

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Brunner lost an eye and several fingers from letter bombs sent to him years ago by Israel's intelligence service, Mossad. In December 1999, rumors surfaced saying that he had died in 1996 and had been buried. However, German journalists visiting Syria said Brunner was living at the Meridian Hotel in Damascus. On March 2, 2001, he was found guilty in absentia by a French court for crimes against humanity and was sentenced to life imprisonment http://www.guardian.co.uk/nazis/article/0,2763,445717,00.html.

Related Topics:
Letter bomb - Israel - Mossad - 1999 - 1996 - German - Damascus - March 2 - 2001 - In absentia - Crimes against humanity - Life imprisonment

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If still alive in 2005 at age 93, he would likely be considered the last surviving major war criminal of the Holocaust yet to be brought to justice.

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