I have to agree. As much as I completely judge the actions of the Nazis, I still feel this guy was probably very much a victim of the circumstances. He was probably pretty much pushed into service, indoctrinated as a child with propaganda, and even if he thought it was wrong, what could he have done? Let’s not forget the end times of the Nazi Reich where even old men were pressed into service and considered traitors and shot if they didn’t comply. It was a fucked up world and many times people either had to obey or be killed. Being a man in conscription age in Nazi Germany must have been a truly shitty situation to be in unless you believed in the shit they told you. You didn’t have much of a choice.
He didn’t personally kill these people. At most he’s complicit in their deaths, but how much is up for debate since (he maintains) he was forced into the job. And the prosecutor’s claims that he “had had contact with the prisoners and had actively prevented their escape” is weird – does that mean they expected him, a kid, to help them escape? It comes across like he caught or helped catch escapees but even then it’s not like he could have caught all 5,000. I think that should be the point of focus. This CHILD was raised and educated with Nazism. He simply grew up in an environment where his ONLY CHOICE was to fight alongside the Nazis. Did he directly (or indirectly) murder innocents? Yes, he did. But he was 17 by the end of the war. That should tell us enough. Every bit of public education he received was Nazi doctrine…