German prosecutors have launched an investigation into a 100-year-old man suspected of serving as a Nazi camp guard who took part in executions during the final years of World War II.

Prosecutors in Dortmund say the alleged crimes occurred between December 1943 and September 1944 at a prisoner-of-war camp in Hemer, in western Germany. The facility held more than 100,000 inmates, the majority of them Soviet prisoners, thousands of whom died due to brutal conditions, forced labor, starvation, and executions.

Senior prosecutor Andreas Brendel told AFP that the investigation follows eyewitness testimony and historical documentation indicating the man participated in killings at the camp. The suspect’s identity has not been released in accordance with German privacy law.

The Hemer probe is part of Germany’s late push to prosecute surviving Nazi perpetrators, decades after most escaped accountability. The effort accelerated following the landmark 2011 conviction of John Demjanjuk, a former Sobibor death camp guard convicted without proof of personally killing anyone. Courts ruled that serving as part of the machinery of mass murder is itself criminal complicity.

The window for justice is rapidly closing. In June 2022, former Sachsenhausen guard Josef Schuetz was sentenced at age 101, only to die months later before serving his five-year prison term. Another suspected Sachsenhausen guard died in April before he could stand trial on charges of complicity in the murder of more than 3,300 people.

The Hemer camp, run by the Wehrmacht, was among the deadliest prisoner facilities on German soil. Soviet POWs were treated with extreme brutality, denied medical treatment, and forced to work in war-critical industries, including tunnel construction for Nazi weapons manufacturing. Thousands died from disease, abuse, malnutrition, or were executed as “unfit” for labor.

German authorities say the investigation must determine whether the 100-year-old suspect was directly involved in executions or knowingly facilitated them as part of the camp’s operations.

Despite the suspect’s age, prosecutors insist that those who contributed to Nazi crimes should still face trial. With fewer perpetrators still alive, each case may represent Germany’s last chance to hold surviving collaborators accountable.

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