László Csizsik-Csatáry (4 March 1915 – 10 August 2013) was an alleged Nazi war criminal, convicted in absentia in 1949. In 2012, his name was added to the Simon Wiesenthal Center's list of most wanted Nazi war criminals.

Biography

Csizsik-Csatáry was born in Mány in 1915. In 1944 he was the Royal Hungarian Police commander in the city of Kassa in Hungary (now Košice in Slovakia). In charge of a Jewish ghetto, he helped organize the deportation of approximately 15,700 Jews to Auschwitz. He is also accused of having inhumanely exercised his authority in a forced labour camp. Csatáry also brutalized the inhabitants of the city. He was convicted in absentia for war crimes in Czechoslovakia in 1948 and sentenced to death. He fled to Canada in 1949 claiming to be a Yugoslav national and settled in Montreal where he became an art dealer. He became a citizen in 1955. In 1997, his Canadian citizenship was revoked by the federal Cabinet for lying on his citizenship application. He fled the country two months later.

In 2012, Csizsik-Csatáry was located in Budapest, Hungary, based on a tip received by the Simon Wiesenthal Center in September 2011. His address was exposed by reporters from The Sun in July 2012. He was reportedly taken into custody on 18 July 2012 by the Hungarian authorities for questioning. On 30 July 2012, Slovak Justice Minister Tomáš Borec told reporters in Bratislava that Slovakia wanted Csatáry to be tried in that country.

A file that the Simon Wiesenthal Center had prepared on Csatáry implicated him in the deportation of 300 people from Kassa in 1941. In August 2012 the Budapest Prosecutor’s Office dropped these charges, saying Csatáry was not in Kassa at the time and lacked the rank to organize the transports. In January 2013 it was reported that Slovak police had found a witness to corroborate other charges relating to deportations of 15,700 Jews from Kassa from May 1944.

On 28 March 2013, the Slovak County Court in Košice has changed the 1948 verdict in Csatáry's case. The verdict was changed from death penalty to the life sentence according to the newspapers. The reason for that was to make the verdict executable. According to the press the Prosecutor's office spokesman said "now the Court has the task to deliver the verdict to the convict".

War crimes indictment

On 18 June 2013, prosecutors in Hungary indicted Csatáry with war crimes, saying he had abused Jews and helped to deport Jews to Auschwitz in World War II. A spokesperson for the Budapest Chief Prosecutor's Office said, "He is charged with the unlawful execution and torture of people, (thus) committing war crimes partly as a perpetrator, partly as an accomplice." His trial could start within three months. The Budapest higher court suspended his case on 8 July 2013, however, because "Csatáry had already been sentenced for the crimes included in the proceedings, in former Czechoslovakia in 1948". The court added it needed to be established whether the 1948 ruling, a death sentence changed to life imprisonment later, could be valid in Hungary and under what circumstances could Csatáry serve the sentence.

Reaction

Efraim Zuroff, director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, said about his finding:

"Now that The Sun has found this war criminal he must be put on trial in Hungary. Csatary was a police commander in the ghetto of Kassa and was responsible for sending 15,700 people to death camps. He was known to be a sadist, he had a determination to round all Jews up and forcibly deport them to Poland. To achieve justice against this man will bring a degree of closure for families of the victims, for the Jewish communities of Hungary and Slovakia."

Efraim Zuroff

Yishayahu Schachar, Jewish survivor who encountered Csatary, said:

"I worked outside the ghetto in the brick factory, cleaning. I remember Csatary loudly screaming orders at Jews. I didn’t work under him but heard the terrible things he did. I remember women digging a ditch with their hands on his orders. He was an evil man and I hope he is brought to justice."

Yishayahu Schachar (2012)

László Karsai, a Hungarian Holocaust historian and the son of a Holocaust survivor, said:

"Csatáry was a small fish. I could name 2,000 people responsible for worse crimes than he was. The money spent hunting down people like him would be better spent fighting the propaganda of those who so energetically deny the Holocaust today."

László Karsai

Death

Csatary died, escaping justice, on August 10, 2013 at a hospital in Budapest from pneumonia. He was 98.