April 21

ITALY

Ex-Nazi Blamed in Italian Massacre Dies


Karl Hass, a former Nazi officer convicted for the wartime massacre of
335 Italian civilians in Rome, died Wednesday in a rest home where he had
been serving a life sentence under house arrest, officials at the home
said.

Hass, 92, had been living at the Garden rest home in the Alban hills near
Rome since December 1996. His health had been failing recently, and on
Wednesday morning he had a heart attack, said the Garden's director,
Riccardo La Rosa.

The former SS major was sentenced in 1998 to life in prison for killings
at the Ardeatine Caves on the outskirts of Rome when the Italian capital
was under German occupation during World War II.

He had been spared prison because of frail health and his age and because
he had returned voluntarily from Switzerland after the sentencing.

Also convicted by military court in the same case was Former SS Capt.
Erich Priebke. He also is serving a life sentence under house arrest in
Rome.

German soldiers rounded up and shot the civilians -- among them 75 Jews --
in retaliation for a bomb attack in Rome by Italian resistance fighters
that killed 33 Germans.

Both Hass and Priebke insisted at their trials that they had no choice but
to follow orders.

Hass had come to Italy from Switzerland in 1996 at prosecutors' request to
testify against Priebke. But he changed his mind and injured himself when
he jumped from his hotel balcony in a bid to avoid taking the stand. He
was then put under house arrest and later indicted.

Survivors include a daughter, Erica, who lived in Geneva, Switzerland, and
who came every few weeks to visit Hass, La Rosa said.

"He didn't talk about the trial; he was very closed, very reserved," said
La Rosa.

In a 1997 interview, Hass told German magazine Der Spiegel that he worked
for U.S. Army counterintelligence in Austria and Italy for a few years
after World War II.

The Ardeatine massacre's anniversary is commemorated in Rome, and feelings
over the killings run high in the capital.

Last month, citing fears for public order, the government's top official
in Rome banned demonstrations planned by both supporters and opponents of
pardon for Priebke. A request seeking Priebke's pardon has been pending
before the Defense Ministry since 1999. President Carlo Azeglio Ciampi
indicated recently that pardon was unlikely.

"Pardon in Italy presumes pardon by the victims' relatives, " Ciampi said,
adding he didn't think the families wanted a pardon. Ciampi himself noted
he goes to the memorial at the caves to pay honor the dead.

Hass "followed the (pardon) debate about Priebke. We talked about it a
little," La Rosa said. "He never nurtured any homes of being free again.
He was sure he would have died here."

During the trial in Rome, investigators determined that Hass had been
receiving his German pension for years despite his role in the Ardeatine
slayings.

The Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Nazi-hunting group,
demanded that the German government release a list of pension payments to
former SS officers to help in the search for war criminals.

(source: Associated Press)