soul

Toronto Billionaire Barry Sherman
And Wife Were Strangled To Death

of blessed memory

continued from page 47

Leader Of Daring Escape
From Auschwitz Dies

(JTA) - Kazimierz Piechowski, a non-
Jewish political prisoner who led a
daring escape from the Auschwitz
death camp using the stolen car of a
Nazi official, has died at 98.
Piechowski died Dec. 16 in
Gdansk, Poland.
He was one of four men in the
escape plan involving stolen SS uni-
forms and weapons, and, according
to the Auschwitz Memorial, a car
used by SS-Hauptsturmführer Paul
Kreutzmann. Piechowski denied
rumors that the men later sent a
postcard to Auschwitz commandant
Rudolf Höss thanking him for the
vehicle.
Driving toward the gate of the
camp, Piechowski recalled to the
Guardian in an interview several
years ago that he yelled in German,
“Wake up, you buggers. Open the
gate or I’ll open you up.”
Piechowski, who was among
Polish Boy Scouts sent to the camp
as a political prisoner in 1940, would
join the resistance following his
escape.

48

December 28 • 2017

jn

One of the other escapees smug-
gled out of the camp what allegedly
was the first detailed document
about the crimes being carried out
at Auschwitz, where 1.1 million peo-
ple were killed, most of them Jews. It
was given to the resistance.
According to a report in the
Guardian, the policy of tattooing
prisoners was introduced after the
spectacular escape.
After the war, Piechowski was sen-
tenced to 10 years in prison by the
communist authorities, who did not
trust members of the former Polish
Home Army resistance. He report-
edly served seven years.
The famous escape was docu-
mented in a 2007 film by Polish
director Marek Pawlowski.
Piechowski played a small support-
ing role as a narrator.
Piechowski later became an
engineer, and when the communist
regime fell in 1989, he traveled the
world with his wife. He has written
two books about his experiences. •

(JTA) - Billionaire philanthropist Barry
Sherman and his wife, Honey, were strangled
to death, the autopsies revealed.
Toronto police released a statement Dec. 17
that said the cause of death was “ligature neck
compression.”
The investigation into the deaths of Barry
Sherman, 75, the founder and chairman of
the generic drug maker Apotex, and his wife,
70, has been turned over to Toronto homicide
detectives, according to reports.
The couple’s bodies were found Dec. 15
hanging from a railing that surrounded their
indoor pool. Police labeled the deaths “suspi-
cious.”
There were no signs of forced entry into
their Toronto-area home, which had been
placed up for sale recently for an asking price
of about $5.4 million. The bodies were discov-
ered by the real estate agent, who let herself in
with the key that had been given to her.
Police reportedly had been considering the
possibility that the deaths were a murder-
suicide, something their family condemned in
a statement issued Saturday.
“Our parents shared an enthusiasm for life
and commitment to their family and com-
munity totally inconsistent with the rumors
regrettably circulated in the media as to the
circumstances surrounding their deaths,” the
statement said.
“We are shocked and think it’s irresponsible

Barry Sherman
was a major
giver to the
United Jewish
Appeal.

that police sources have reportedly advised
the media of a theory which neither their fam-
ily, their friends nor their colleagues believe to
be true.”
Barry Sherman was the 15th richest
Canadian, according to Canadian Business
magazine, with an estimated wealth of $4.77
billion Canadian, or $3.65 billion.
In addition to donating some $39 million
to the United Jewish Appeal, Sherman was a
fundraiser for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s
Liberal Party.
Honey Sherman sat on the boards of several
Jewish organizations, including Mount Sinai’s
Women’s Auxiliary, the Simon Wiesenthal
Center and the American Jewish Joint
Distribution Committee.
The couple donated millions to local hos-
pitals, schools and charities. •