Welcome all of you in the audience in the theater as well as those of you watching online tonights Program Limits of justice. Cosponsor of tonights program, youll hear from representative of the embassy a little bit later in the evening. I also have the pleasure of serving as the cochair of the museums Washington Lawyers Committee. My husband and i have also enjoyed a long and extremely meaningful relationship with this extraordinary institution. The institution of the museum is one that not only honors the victim victims of the holocaust but stands as a stark reminder to the importance and relevance of lessons of the holocaust and the relevance of those lessons to issues of conflict in todays world. The museum has found compelling ways to engage many audiences, people from every background, religion and political perfect situation. While the experience is grounded in holocaust history, it serves as a powerful springboard to reflect on contemporary issues, especially genocide. The museum also is a stark reminder that the task of pursuing the notion of never again is unending at a time when hatred, antisemitism are clearly on the rise around the world in our own communities across the United States, we all must be willing to stand up. At a time when social media and a rapidly changing world magnify that hate, the lessons of the holocaust are more urge enter than ever. The museums motto, what you do matters, reflects that idea and asks each of us to be part of the solution, to push back against these trends and to make this world a better place. Well explore what it means to achieve justice after the defeat of nazi germany. Tackle complicated and interesting questions, including is the perpetrator ever too old to prosecute . Is it ever too late for accountability . The conversation will last about 15 minutes and then well turn to the audience for your questions for about 15 or 20 minutes. You should all have received an index card and to the extent you have a question, submit that card for the panel. Copies of her recent book citizen 1865 shell do so outside the theater. Ill tell you i have read debbies book. It is really wonderful. Those of you who have not read it, i really recommend it to you. It is my honor to introduce tonights opening speaker, irene weiss. 75 years ago, troops approached auschwitz. Atrocities have been reported worldwide, People Struggle to believe them. As the visual evidence became available and survivors began to the magnitude and horror of the holocaust. One of the few remaining auschwitz survivors has devoted her life precisely to this mission, by telling her story as many to as many people as possible, irene weiss hopes that, quote, we will be able to recognize and resist the forces of hatred, prejudice and division that exists even in our time. It is my pleasure and honor to introduce irene weiss [ applause ] thank you very much for inviting me here tonight. In 2015 and 2016, i was asked to testify in the trial of ss sergeant oscar grune and reinhold hanig. My family and i were part of the hungarian transports to auschwitz that arrived during the time they worked there. In addition to be a coplaintiff, i needed to have had close family members who were murdered there. As a coplaintiff, i was not required to recognize gruning and harding, who served as guards while i was a prisoner in auschwitz. I, along with other coplaintiffs, were called to testify about what we saw and experienced in auschwitz and about the role gruning and harding played as guards in facilitating the efficient process of genocide. In the spring of 1944, my family was deported to auschwitz from hungary. I was 13 years old. Upon arrival at the camp, my mother and my four siblings were taken to the gas chamber and killed, along with hundreds of others from that transport. My father was forced to work as a commando, removing corpses from the gas chamber. I learned later that he was shot and killed. My 17yearold sister, serena, and i were selected for slave labor. We worked in the storage warehouse located near crematorium number four and five. Our job was to sort mountains of belongings brought to the thousands of people brought to auschwitz today, preparing the belongings to be shipped back to germany. We worked there for eight months. Day and night, columns of Young Mothers with children and elderly men and women took their last steps as they passed by our barracks through the gate that led to the gas chamber. My brain could not absorb what i was seeing. I thought this place was not on this earth. In january 1945, as a russian army approached, auschwitz was evacuated and we were forced thousands of others on a death march, deeper into germany. Eventually ending up in a sub camp of robins brook. Evidence of the trial established that from 1941 to 1944, gruning worked as a socalled bookkeeper of auschwitz. He was collecting the money and valuables taken from arriving prisoners. He also worked on the selection ra ramp. Haning was an ss guard at auschwitz from early 1942 until 1944, monitoring arriving prisoners as they were selected for work or sent to the gas chambers. He also helped direct and control people during the separation of families. It was on record that gruning denied any personal responsibility for the mass murder at auschwitz. He said he was morally guilty, but not legally. He said he acted out of a sense of duty and was just following orders. He believed that the jews were enemies of the german people. He simply did his part so that the camp functioned efficiently. He referred to the killing as the hungarian action, or tending to the arriving jews, reverting to nazi jargon, never saying gassing or murder. He described witnessing an ss guard bashing a babys head against the side of a truck, an action he described as inappropriate. After all, he explained, the baby could just as well have been killed in another, less messy way. For instance, by shooting. This was his way of showing that he had empathy. It showed that the mass killing of thousands of babies and others was not a cause for any reflection or regret on his part. Unlike gruning, who gazed around the courtroom at the coplaintiffs, haning never looked up at all. He kept his head down and his chin pressed against his chest. Some interpreted this as contempt. Others thought that he felt overwhelmed. None of us knew what to think. His job had been to guard the camp. Experts testified that his ss group was on duty when the deportation trains arrived. Without the guards, the mass murder could not have been possible. He had a leadership role and performed his work so well that he was promoted twice during his time there. My memory of the guards as a 13yearold was terrifying, with their tall, shiny boots and elegant uniforms. They had contempt for us. They had complete power over our life and death. They looked at us with contempt. You did not look them in the eye. At the trials, i instead encountered a couple of frail, old men in wheelchairs, accompanied by a nurse. But if these old men had been wearing their nazi uniforms, i would have trembled. And all the horror that i experienced as a child in auschwitz would have returned. Any person who wore that uniform in that place represented terror, and the depths to which humanity can sink, regardless of function they performed. So why had i agreed to testify . I was hoping to hear some regrets that they participated in a monumental tragedy. They were also i was hoping to hear that they also were suffering from their memories of that time. I wanted them i wanted to hear from them and the others who testified about what the consequences were of what they did. Looking back, did they feel misled by the evil laws and ideology of the time . Did they regret the part they played in that evil . Did they have some lessons to impart to the world today about resisting the effects of mass indoctrination and dehumanization . I was looking to confront and face face to face with a person who participated in the destruction of my family. During both trials, photographs of my mother and siblings, taken by nazi guards on the day of our arrival, were displayed on overhead screens, becoming part of the Permanent Court record and clearly visible to the defendants. We never received any answers to the questions. Gruning and haning did not seem to grasp the perspective of a lifetime, the full, moral implication of what they had done as young men. This recurring human failure to take responsibility for evil acts or even to properly distinguish between good and evil when under the influence of nationalism and propaganda may sit the more important that will remain on the alert against these forces. A whole generation of germans, the children and grandchildren of perpetrators of the nazi genocide heard very little from their parents and grandparents about what they had done in auschwitz and other factories of death. It is time, at long last, to stop suppressing this history. Now one positive aspect of testifying in these trials was the close relationship my family and i developed with the german prosecuting attorneys. Their compassion and sense of mission helped to see me through the ordeal of the trials. The outpouring of support from the german public was also gratifying. When the survivors arrived each day to the court, the local citizens were lined up around the block, waiting to get in. The trials were wildly widely covered by the german media, and i can only hope that they contributed to the education of the german public about this dark period in history. To that end, i joined other survivors, government officialsh commemoration of the liberation of auschwitz. Our presence in that place, the symbol of ultimate evil, further added to the worlds understanding of what happened there. One observation, the german courts were careful to ensure that these two old men received due process and were given every consideration related to their health and age. The tragic irony, of course, is that my family and millions of others jewish civilians were enslaved and killed without any due process at all. Thank you so much for listening. Good evening. Am i on . Can you hear me in the back . All right. Good evening. Id like to begin first by thanking mrs. Irene rice for your moving and courageous and inspirational words. Thank you. Irene, you and the other survivors remind us that justice is much more than an abstract concept that we cannot lose sight when were discussing it of the actual human toll that the crimes represent and the pain and loss of vifrosurvivors families knows no statute of limitations and therefore also many crimes are not subject to a statute of limitations. So thank you for that framing. To night we have an outstand panel who im delighted to introduce. Let me begin to my left with debbie sensaber. She is an investigating reporter that contributes to the Washington Post and author of a really gripping new book titled citizen 865 the hunt for hitlers hidden soldiers in america. I can tell you i took it with me on work trip. I needed to prep for this panel. I read it all in one flight. Its really that good. Debbie is also the newly named director of investigative reporting at northwestern university. So welcome, debbie. Thank you. Were also delighted to be joined by ricky gerwi it. Z. Ricky is an experienced Television Produce eastern id like to congratulate you on your first feature documentary, the accountant of auschwitz. Were also pleased to recognize her coproducer who is also in the audience. Currently rickie is a producer at the monk debates, the Worlds Largest public debate forum. And last but certainly not least, my colleague dr. Barry white who is a Senior Historian here at the United StatesHolocaust Memorial museum. Barry is former deputy chief and chief historian down the street at the u. S. Department of justice, the Justice Departments human rights and special prosecutions section. So we have a lot to learn tonight. Before i turn to the panel, i want to note that in a tremendous stroke of serendipity we could not have timed the schedule of this panel much better. Some of you may have seen in the Washington Post last week a really great story by debbie or in other news outlets about a truly unique and Ground Breaking collection of perpetrator materials, some 361 photographs and dozens of documents collected by the commandant of the killing center. We here at the Holocaust Museum are pleased to be the permanent repository for this collection. What youre looking at this morning up on the screen is from just this morning. And this morning we had them delivered our collections facilities. Youre seeing pictures of our gla gloved hands as we continue to preserve and stabilize and examine the kind of material that would have proved evidence in the types of trials and prosecutions that we are describing today. So truly a momentous day for the museum and for this field. Debbie, lets begin with you if we could. To write your book, citizen 865, how did you get interested in this topic and what brought you to the story . Thank you for having me. So i was at a cocktail party, new Years Eve Party in maryland in the last few moments of 2016. I fell into a conversation with the Justice Department lawyer who over the course of about 2 hours started telling me about this unit inside the Justice Department that had spent 30 or 10 years hunting for nazi war criminals living on u. S. Soil. I remember thinking that night two things, one was how was it possible that 70 plus years after the end of the war we were still finding nazi war criminals and collaborators here in the United States . And too, for me, i was intrigued by the idea of the people doing the work, particularly the historians as an investigative reporter. I feel hike i relay a lot to people that dig through documents for a living. I really wanted to know the people who had spent the bulk of the professional careers searching for these people. How was it possible they spent day after day and year after year digging inside living inside the darkest moments in history . And then going at home at night to their families and their husbands and wives and their children and how was it possible for them to balance those things . And i was fascinated by the back stories of the people doing the work. And, indeed, in your book you really follow the sort of two threads, one about the cases themselves, the investigative process, and the other about the people like barry and your colleagues who did it and how you came up with Creative Strategies for pursuing cases over which we might not have had jurisdiction. So well turn to that in a minute. Rickie, id like to ask you a similar story. How did the film come about . And was this, in fact, storty th the story you set about to tell at the outset . As you mentioned in your opening, i was working as a Television News producer and in canada. In april 2015, we get ticks every day that tell us what the main the headlines are and said auschwitz guard goes on trial in germany 94. I thoushgts hes guilty. Whats the point of a trial . You no he . And the more i read about his case but also his story and the legal precedent that allowed him to be prosecuted, i just thought, wow, theres a lot more here than just a closed closed case. Like this is theres a lot to unpack here and theres a lot of both moral and legal am bbiguit. I think a documentary is a great place to explore that gray area. You know, for those that havent seen the film, its use this is trial to get at kind of the failure of the german prosecutors after the war and going after the perpetrators and how this new generation has tried to rectify that by interpreting the law in a better way and also the people who are therefore being prosecuted are kind of the lower level guards. The people like Oscar Groning or haning who just made sure the cam was running efficiently. You always kneel this is not going the way i had planned. How low is someone in the hierarchy and what it that guilt . So lets have a look. It is too little, too late. How ridiculous is that that theyre doing it now when the people are all in their 90s . [ speaking german ] barry, as swwe said in at th introduction, youre a historian. This is not the career path you had in mind. What brought you to this work and since osi, the office of special investigations as is former name of the doj office, it was only established in 1979. How did you and your colleagues grapple with some of these questions about is it too late . How old is someone . What is right . I did not set out thinking i was going to investigate nazi crimes in the college i studied european history and languages. And one of the things that really got me to focus more on german history was actually the experience of growing up in the segregated south. My parents worked for desegregation and civil rights. I recognized the cruelty and evil of racism early and i wrestled with the question of why so many people i knew who were themselves kind and considered themselves good christians and patriotic americans. We go along and even support a system that seemed obviously contrary to their values. And german history in the early 20th century provides the ultimate example of people supposedly civilized, educated people descending from prejudice to persecution and ultimately to genocide which we would like to think is the most uncivilized of behaviors. I wrote on a military topic, not a good choice in terms of finding a lucrative career. As it turned out, osi considered my knowledge of the german army and ability to read old german handwriting to be assets. And, of course, when i was given the opportunity to help achieve some measure of justice for the victims of racism, you know, i felt lucky and honored to have work to do that i was fully committed to. And how long did you end up doing this unexpected, unplanned thing . When i was hired, we were told the office would last three to five years at most. I worked there 29 years. The question about the age of perpetrators and, yes, we got that a tlot. A lot of people challenged us. Debbie writes about the pushback we got. People would say why are you going after these poor old men for something that they did decades ago . And i would generally respond, yeah, i agree with you. It would have been much better if they had been brought to account back in the day. And if they hadnt been able to lie about their activities and get visas that may have gone to actual refugees or victims. But when do you suggest that we set the