"Very Special Present"

"I am guilty! I am a sinner!" screamed fat-faced Ilse Koch to her jailers. In her frenzy--whether genuine or faked--she smashed the furniture in her cell and babbled about heaven, hell and sin.

Later last week the "Bitch of Buchenwald," no longer the doll-eyed ruminant, collapsed in a hysterical heap in an Augsburg courtroom, was carried off to a hospital for mental observation. Several doctors said she was suffering from temporary insanity caused by a guilt complex; others said Ilse was faking in an attempt to delay justice. The 43-year-old widow of Karl Koch, commander of the Nazi extermination camp, was on trial for the second time for crimes committed at Buchenwald where 50,000 died. Charges against her: instigating the murder of some 35 German inmates, instigating the attempted murder of 135 others.

This time Ilse was being tried by her own countrymen, who grabbed her when the U.S. set her free from Landsberg prison last year. Ilse had served four years for crimes against allied inmates, got out when an Army review board concluded that although she "encouraged, aided and participated" in Buchenwald's operation, "there was no convincing evidence that she had selected inmates for extermination in order to secure tattooed skins, or that she possessed any articles made of human skin."

Last week Witness Peter Planiseck testified that he once saw Ilse order a prisoner to strip so she could see his tattoos; then she wrote down the prisoner's number. That night he was executed.

Witness Richard Gryc testified that Ilse told another prisoner. "What a lovely tattoo you have." Shortly after, the prisoner was poisoned.

Witness Ludwig Tobias said Ilse kicked out 13 of his teeth. Six witnesses testified that Ilse rode her horse through a group of prisoners, lashed them with her whip.

Witness Wilhelm Gellinick said he heard Ilse tell her husband: "My little pigeon, I think it is time for that old man [in a working party] to grovel a bit." The old man, said Gellinick, was made to roll up & down a hill several times, later died as a result. Gellinick testified that he worked in Buchenwald's pathology laboratory, saw human skin brought in and worked into lampshades for presentation to Ilse's husband.

Another former laboratory worker, Joseph Ackermann, said the director ordered a "very special present" for Koch's birthday, a lamp of human skin and bone. "The light was switched on by pressure against the little toe of one of the three human feet which formed the stand."

Last week Ilse's hysterics and absence from the courtroom did not delay her trial. The procession of witnesses went on, was expected to continue at least another four weeks. Since West Germany has abolished the death penalty, the prosecution hopes to put Ilse behind bars for life.

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