Former SS officer charged with over 36,000 counts of accessory to murder at Mauthausen

Around 190,000 people, including many thousands of Jews and Soviet prisoners of war, were held at Mauthausen, the largest concentration camp in Austria.

Approximately 90,000 of those were killed by various means, including gassing, lethal injection, shootings, starvation or exposure. At least 36,223 were killed during the time Hans H is said to have served as an SS guard. 

The SS evacuated Mauthausen in early May 1945, just prior to its liberation by the US Army. Hans H is accused of serving both in the outer perimeter of the camp and inside, as well as guarding prisoner work details at a nearby quarry.

The rock quarry at Mauthausen was at the base of a climb known as the "Stairs of Death". Exhausted and malnourished prisoners were often forced to run up the 186 stairs, carry roughly-hewn blocks of stone often weighing as much as 50 kilograms.

Those who survived were often placed in rows at the edge of a cliff known as "The Parachutists Wall". At gunpoint, each prisoner would have the option of being shot or pushing the prisoner in front of him off the cliff.

Trials held in Germany over the last decade have advanced the legal view that Nazi camp guards can be charged as accessories to murder even without direct evidence of them actively taking part in killings.

The Berlin prosecutor’s office said it had determined that Hans H is able to stand trial.

A court will now review the charges and independently determine whether the accused is fit to be tried.