Posted on 02/17/2007 8:54:48 PM PST by Atlantic Bridge
According to a article in German that was published in the German magazine "Der Spiegel" the ruthless French nazi-collaborator Maurice Papon died in the age of 96 years on February 17, 2007.
As secretary general of the prefecture Bordeaux Papon signed orders for the imprisonment and deportation or the jews in that area. Altogether there were 76.000 jews -among them 12.000 kids- arrested in France and displaced into the concentration camps of the nazis. Only 2.500 survived the Holocaust.
Papon is definitly responsible for the deportation of 1,560 Jewish men, women and children. The majority were sent directly to detention camps at Drancy internment camp, at the outskirts of Paris, and then to Auschwitz or similar concentration camps. Few survived.
By mid-1944, when it was clear that the war was turning against the Germans, Papon began to inform on the Nazis to the Resistance—for which he was later to be decorated with the treasured "Carte d'Ancien Combattant de la Resistance".
Papon retained his official functions after the war, although, according to Olivier Guichard, Charles de Gaulle "perfectly knew his past" and had received him personally after the liberation of Bordeaux.
He went to Morocco in 1954 as general secretary of the protectorate, and there helped crush the Moroccan nationalists. He then returned to Constantine in 1956 during the Algerian War (1954-62), where he actively participated in the repression and the use of torture against the civilian population.
In March 1958, he was named chief of the Paris police (préfet de police) by Félix Gaillard (Radical)'s government. As prefect of police, he had an important role in the May 13, 1958 crisis which brought de Gaulle to power. He took part in the Gaullist confidential meetings which assured the instrumentalization of the crisis, preparing de Gaulle's nomination as President of the Council, which granted him extraordinary powers. On July 12, 1961, president Charles de Gaulle bestowed on him the French Legion of Honour for service to the state.
He commanded the repression during the Paris massacre of 1961. On October 17, 1961, after a peaceful march organized by the Algerian National Liberation Front, 40 (according to French government) to 200 (according to historian Jean-Luc Einaudi) Algerian civilians were killed in Paris, many of whom thrown in the Seine river by the French police. The exact number of the dead remains unknown.
From 1967 to 1968, he was president of the company Sud Aviation. Elected deputy of Cher as candidate of the UDR Gaullist Party in 1968, he is reelected in 1973 and in 1978 (as member of the RPR neo-Gaullist party). He was also elected mayor of Saint-Amand-Montrond in 1971 and reelected in 1977.
From 1968 to 1971, he was treasurer of the Gaullist Party. President of the Commission of the Finances of the National Assembly in 1972, he is the rapporteur général du budget (deputy presenting the budget) from 1973 to 1978. He then served as Budget Minister under Prime Minister Raymond Barre and President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing from 1978 to 1981, before finishing his mayor mandate in 1983 and renouncing to political activity.
Little by little, evidence of his responsibility in the Holocaust emerged, and throughout the 1980s he fought a string of legal battles.
Le Canard enchaîné newspaper published on May 6, 1981, an article titled "Papon, aide de camps. Quand un ministre de Giscard faisait dé- porter des juifs," between the two turns of the presidential election opposing Socialist candidate François Mitterrand to the right-wing candidate Valéry Giscard d'Estaing. In this article, the newspaper showed documents signed by Papon which demonstrated his responsibility in the deportation of 1,690 Jews of Bordeaux to Drancy from 1942 to 1944.
Charges of crimes against humanity were first brought in 1983, but the whole investigation was cancelled in 1987 because of legal technicalities (a mistake by the investigative magistrate). New charges were laid in 1988, and the investigation finished in 1995. Papon finally went to trial on 8 October 1997, after fourteen years of bitter legal wrangling. The trial went on to be the longest in French history, while Papon denounced a "Moscow Trial," going so far as to assimilate his status to Alfred Dreyfus.
The trial had different meanings for different French people; for some it was the last chance to confront their collaborationist history in a court room. Because of his arrogance, his contempt and his refusal to express regrets or remorse during and since the lawsuit, Papon drew contempt from many.
Papon was accused of ordering the arrest and deportation of 1,560 Jews, including children and the elderly, between 1942 and 1944.
In his 36-minute final speech to the jury, Papon rarely evoked the victims of the Holocaust, but instead portrayed himself as a victim; of "the saddest chapter in French legal history."
Papon was convicted in 1998 and given a 10-year prison term, which was criticized by some for being too short. His lawyers filed an appeal before the Court of Cassation. As Papon had fled to Switzerland, his appeal was summarily denied because of the Court's practice of requiring persons convicted of crimes and sentenced to prison terms to give themselves up prior to the appeal. After Switzerland sent him back to France to serve his prison sentence, he was sent to La Santé jail on October 22, 1999. Papon was also stripped of all his decorations; under French law, people convicted of severe crimes cannot be members of the Legion of Honor.
He applied for release on the grounds of poor health in March 2000, but President Jacques Chirac denied the petition. He continued to fight legal battles while in prison, taking his denied appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, where he argued the French court's denial of his appeal on a technicality (rather than on the merits of the case) constituted a violation of his right to appeal his conviction. The Court agreed in July 2002, admonishing the Court of Cassation and awarding Papon FF429,192 (approx. €65,400) in legal costs, but no damages.
However, Papon's lawyers had meanwhile been pursuing a separate appeal in France, petitioning for his release under the terms of a March 2002 law that provided for the release of ill and elderly prisoners to receive outside medical care. His doctors affirmed that Papon, by this time 92 years old, was essentially incapacitated, so he became the second person released under the terms of the law, leaving jail on September 18, 2002, less than 3 years into his sentence.
The text above is a abstract to a excellent article in Wikipedia about Maurice Papon. You can read it here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maurice_Papon
Concerning our discussion about capital punishment I have to admit that this guy should have been executed.
Western Europe Ping!
Now what about the French who are collaborating with the enemy today?
Hope it hurt!
Collaborating with the enemy is no exclusive attribute of the French. Simply take a look into your own congress.
Say Hi to Stalin and Hitler Shi#bag!!
He is death finally? Well riddances!
GOOD burn in the hell you Frog wimp
I can only hope this misguided soul repented of his evil before he died.
In a sane world, this sonuvabitch would have been executed and his body hung in the public square to feed the birds...during the Liberation of France.
Allowing the bastard to live so long, was an insult to society..
But then, one must realize - we're talking about the French..
The French never did put much value on anyone other than their own sorry asses..
Semper Fi
Being responsible for deportations is not necessarily the same as conscious cooperation in the deportees' deaths. We need to drop the hysteria and get some more facts before we froth at the mouth about this.
How embarassment... Dealing with titles like that is unpossible.
Papon never did recant. In an interview shortly before his death he continued to claim he was the victim of a conspiracy.
The French, having arrested him and tried him, found him guilty, and sentenced him to 10 years in prison. They let him go after only three years.
He died at 96 in his own bed.
His "soul" is far uglier than his face.
A real wonder. To outclass his sexy smile seems to be impossible to me.
A truly repellent individual. The fact that folks like this get only 10 makes ne doubt the existence of an almighty.
Maurice Papon in 1947
Papon avoided the post-war purge of Vichy Nazi collaborators. even though it was well known Papon as head of the south-western Gironde region of France during the Nazi occupation, he signed effective death warrants for hundreds of Jews by ordering their deportation to concentration camps.
The picture below explains why Vichy Nazi Maurice Papon was not prosecuted as a collaborating war criminal.
After the war, Papon moved to Paris as Prefet de Police under General de Gaulle, a post he held until 1968.
At Maurice Papon's death the screams of his Jewish victims tormented him. Papon was most likely also greeted by fellow Vichy traitors, Gestapo officials and many Nazi SS killers - at the gates of Hell!
After Switzerland sent him back to France to serve his prison sentence, he was sent to La Santé jail on October 22, 1999. Papon was also stripped of all his decorations; under French law, people convicted of severe crimes cannot be members of the Legion of Honor.
lol
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