Page 10-Thursday, July 10, 1980-The Michigan Daily
.~r-.~
Milhionaire
sentenced
for WWHI
war. crimes
ROTTERDAM, Netherlands (AP)-A war crimes
court sentenced 81-year-old millionaire art collector
Pieter Menten to 10 years in jail and fined him $50,000
yesterday for collaborating with the Nazis in the
massacre of 20-30 Polish Jews 39 years ago.
Justice Ministry officials said Menten collapsed at
his home soon after learning of the sentence and was
taken to a hospital where two detectives were
stationed at his bedside. Menten had been excused
from yesterday's court session because of illness.
THE COURT RULED the prosecution failed to
prove Menten shot anyone personally. But the court
said it was "convinced Menten acted in unison" with
a German SS squad that committed the mass
slayings July 7,.1941, at the former Polish village of
Podhoroce, now part of the Soviet Ukraine.
It was Menten's second conviction in the case.
In 1977, he was sentenced to 15 years in prison on
the collaboration charge, but the sentence was over-
turned on technical grounds by the supreme court
and Menten was released from prison in December
1978.
THE COURT THEN ordered a retrial in Rotter-
dam.
Menten, now the oldest prisoner in Holland, con-
sistently proclaimed his innocence. At one point he
claimed he was the victim of mistaken identification
because his younger brother, Dirk, was at the
execution. But witnesses insistedPieter Menten, who
owned a large pre-war estate outside Podhoroce, took
part in the killings.
After some early post-war troubles with Dutch
authorities, Menten lived in wealthy seclusion in a
mansion in Blaricum, east of Amsterdam.
In 1976, renewed press reports linked him with the
Podhoroce massacre. He fled to Switzerland to
escape his impending arrest but was expelledby the
Swiss and returned to Holland for his first trial.
DURING THE SECOND trial, which lasted two
months, the court heard evidence from 75-yeal-old
Dirk Menten, now living in Cannes, France who said
Pieter told him in 1943 he had been present at the
execution of Jews in Podhoroce two years earlier.
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- - - - A Public Service of This Newspaper 5 The Adivertisig ouclm N to a
Lie down and be counted.
F VIN!
1
crackdown
on police
brutality
advocated
WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S.
Commission on Civil Rights, calling for
a nationwide crackdown on police
brutality in the wake of the Miami riots,
urged Congress yesterday to give
federal prosecutors more power to
prosecute police misconduct.
"Too often today, law and order
means being shot or being killed by the
police," said Mary Berry, thesnew vice-
chairman of the six-member com-
mission.
"AS A NATION, we must do
everything we can to end police abuse
and the civil violence which it
promotes," the commission declared in
a 30-page statement on "Police Prac-
tices and the Preservation of Civil
Rights." The panel recommended a
series of actions to root out police
misconduct.
The statement was culled from a still-
unfinished commission report on police
practices, based on a two-year probe
that included hearings on alleged police
brutality in Houston and Philadelphia.
The commission said it decided to make
recommendations now because of the
severity of the Miami riots and
problems elsewhere.
Eighteen persons were killed and
businessesnsuffered at least $100 million
in damage in riots that erupted May l7
in Miami's Liberty City. The violence
was sparked by the acquittal of four
former Dade County policemen
charged in the beating death of a black
Miami businessman, Arthur McDuffie.
ARTHUR FLEMMING, the com-
mission chairman, criticized civic
leaders and power-brokers in Miami for
not doing enough to redress the
problems of poverty and injustice.
"They've got to come out of their
boardrooms . . and their luncheon
clubs" to solve those problems com-
munity-wide, saidFlemming.
A third commissioner, Stephen Horn,
president of California State University
at Long Beach, echoed an advertising
line: "Do I fix it now at less cost, or let
it explode? ... Citizens ought to ask
themselves which is the cheaper
solution." '
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In America, 3% of the people give 100% of all the
blood that's freely donated.
Which means that if only 1% more people-.
maybe you-became donors, it would add
over thirty percent more blood to America's
voluntary bloodstream. Think of it!
But forget arithmetic. Just concentrate
on one word.
The word is Easy.
Giving blood is easy. You hardly feel it (in fact,
some people say they feel better physically after
a blood donation).
And, of course, everybody feels better emotionally.
Because it's a great feeling knowing your one easy blood
donation has helped up to five other people to live.
So how about it, 1% of America? Are you going to lie
down and be counted?
Call your local Red Cross Chapter, or your community's
volunteer blood bank. We need you now.
RedCOss is counrn
on yol.
.. -a
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