Dutch justice for Menten

Fred Bratman

Pieter Menten returned to his mansion out-' side Amsterdam on 30 May when the Dutch Supreme Court overturned a fifteen-year prison sentence for his 'involvement' in the Nazi SS execution of twenty-eight Polish Jews in July 1941. The Dutch court has ordered a new trial, but it may never take place, as the seventy-nine-year-old art collector, now in hospital suffering from diabetes, has powerful friends among the Dutch authorities.

Menten is a millionaire, a fact that has helped him avoid prosecution until recently. Since the end of the second world war he has been a large contributor to the Catholic People's Party (KVP), and a reputable member of Dutch society. Unlike other SS members, Menten did not flee to some South American country to avoid the law. He was able to do that without leaving the Netherlands. Money has never been a problem for Menten. After the war he claimed damages for the property he owned in Poland. The West German government repaid him £45,000 for his property. The Dutch government were also generous with their money. They paid Menten an undisclosed sum for art treasures that he said he owned which apparently were nestroyed by resistance fighters in the closing days of the war. It is not clear whether he really owned these art works to begin with, or whether he stole them from his Jewish victims.

There was some minor trouble after the war for Menten. He was arrested by the Dutch authorities and tried as a Nazi collaborator, but he was not accused of any heinous acts. Menten protested his inno

cence at his trial in 1950, and claimed that he was merely an interpreter for the Nazis when they marched through Poland. The Dutch court apparently believed him, for they sentenced him to only one year in prison. An appeal court must have also believed his story for they further reduced his sentence to eight months.

Menten's recent troubles stem from the memories of Haviv Kanaan. In 1944 Kanaan, then known as Lieber Krumholz, met Jacob Loebel, an old family friend, in Palestine. Both had lived in Lvov in the Polish province of Eastern Galicia. Kanaan had not heard of the whereabouts of his family, and Loebel broke the bad news telling Kanaan that his family had been wiped out by the Nazis. Loebel added that Pieter Menten was responsible for their murder. Both had known Menten because he had lived in Lvov since the 1920s. Menten had been a business associate of Kanaan's uncle, Isaac Pistiner. Their business affairs turned sour, and, when Menten returned in a Nazi uniform in 1941, he was apparently out for revenge. Though Menten could not find Pistiner he did find his wife, daughters and sons. According to the story Loebel told Kanaan, Menten took as many of Pistiner's male relations as he could round up and had them shot in the head.

At Prodhordce, another village in Galicia, Menten is said to have arrested all the Jewish males. One survivor of the round-up recalled that he saw two SS men pointing their guns at a group of men standing in front of a pit that had been dug especially for this occasion. Moments later the pit was transformed into a grave as it was filled with bodies. The survivor said he recognised one of the SS men. He said it was Pieter Menten.

When Menten was tried in 1949 he was not accused of any of these crimes, but rather for minor acts of collaboration. His defence was handled by Leonardus Kortenhorst, then chairman of the Dutch Parliament and a K VP party official.

Meanwhile, the Dutch authorities were receiving documents from Israeli officials implicating Menten in the murder of twenty-eight Polish Jews. The Justice Minister Jan van Maarseveen, and the then Proctor-General Jan van Agt, told the Israelis that the Menten case was considered closed. Both Dutch officials were in a position to initiate action against Menten if aprima facie case existed. Instead they did nothing.

In 1952 Menten received a letter from Justice Minister L. A. Donker promising Menten that he would not be prosecuted for his years in Poland on the grounds that his earlier conviction had taken care of all his misdeeds. This letter was Menten's green light to continue his rich way of life with the assurance of no government interference, No one has suggested that Donker broke the law with this missive, but he certainly bent it to accommodate Menten.

Everything would probably have remained safe for Menten if he had not given an interview to a Dutch daily newspaper in the first week of May 1976 announcing the sale of a large portion of his art collection. This story got back to Kanaan who called his friend, Dutch journalist Hans Knoop, and they both began to uncover the story. In mid-November of that year Justice officials were finally convinced that there was enough evidence to have Menten arrested. But a funny thing happened when the police went to arrest Menten — he was gone. The decision to pick up Menten was

made on a Thursday, but the actual arrest

was delayed until Monday. Also the dis

cussions that Justice officials had were held at a favourite restaurant of Menten's one mile from his mansion. A preliminary report released after the furore surrounding the failure of the arrest said that it was highly unusual for a meeting of this nature to be held anywhere but at the Palace of Justice.

Thus there is little doubt that there was a leak either in the Justice or police department which provided Menten with warning of his impending arrest. A former Dutch Foreign Office official familiar with the case

recently remarked: 'A rich man in his position must take precautions, and Menten knew all the angles.'

When Knoop tracked down Menten in Switzerland in December 1976 he thought he had outsmarted the authorities, for extradition appeared unlikely. As Menten Was led to the local police station he hurled Insults at Knoop calling him a communist and a dirty Jew. But the Swiss government did expel, instead of extradite, Menten under a 1965 decree. The seldom-invoked law permitted the expulsion of anyone susPected of war crimes where sufficient evidence was produced.

Justice Minister van Agt, an old name in the case, had to cut short a trip to Romania to face criticism over the mishandling of the Menten affair. The Dutch government did not fall, but it was thought that van Agt Would resign. He did not. There was too much of a public outcry about the case for the Dutch authorities once again to sweep the dirt under the carpet. By this time both the Soviets and the Israelis had expressed an interest in the case. Both were willing to help the prosecution. The Soviets permitted a Dutch team to fly to the Ukraine where the massacre was alleged to have taken Place, and the Israelis flew witnesses to the Hague for the trial. The Dutch investigators returned from the Soviet Union with pic

tures of a mass grave that had been unearthed, and sworn testimony from some of the survivors. Throughout the trial last Year Menten proclaimed his innocence. He called the trial 'a show. . It is a KGB stunt. T, he public prosecutor [Frans Habermeehl] 'S a pawn on the chess board of the Russians.'

One aspect of the prosecution's case was that Menten had permission from Himmler to use four railway cars to cart away art treasures Menten is alleged to have stolen from his victims. He has termed this charge

'nonsensical,' and was quick to add: Those Jews in the country were poor bastards and from them I had nothing to take.' Witness after witness pointed to Menten as the Nazi SS officer responsible for the Murder of at least twenty-eight Polish Jews. Yet Menten has never admitted any guilt or shown any remorse for the victims. When shown a photograph of himself wearing a ,Nazi uniform Menten denied it was him. You are mistaking me for my brother,' he said, Menten was duly convicted, but the utch Supreme Court set aside the cony iction largely on the grounds that the judge in the trial last year had not properly taken account of the letter from the Justice Minister in 1952. The decision suggested that Menten had been punished for these crimes by the eight months he spent in jail.

If the past is any indication of the willingness of the Dutch authorities to prosecute Menten they will want to forget and bury the bad memories of his former activities.Only Soviet and Israeli pressure w!ll create an atmosphere where Menten Will be forced to stand trial once again.