An Italian military court on Friday sentenced a former Nazi corporal who resides in Canada to life imprisonment and ordered damages to be paid to partisan and deportee groups for murder and torture, judicial officials said.
Italy asked Canada to extradite former SS member Misha Seifert, 76, who has lived near Vancouver since 1951 under the name of Michael Seifert. He did not attend the five-day trial.
The court ordered Seifert to pay 100 million lire (51.600 euros, 42,800 dollars) to an Italian partisan association and the national association of World War II deportees.
He was charged with 18 counts of murder and acts of torture committed between June 1944 and April 1945 at a Nazi camp set up in the city of Bolzano during the occupation of northern Italy by German troops.
Some 11,000 Jews, political prisoners, partisans and army deserters were held at the camp at some point before being taken elsewhere.
Military prosecutor Bartolomeo Constantini welcomed the verdict, but Seifert's court-appointed counsels, Massimo Ruffo and Giulio Oppi, said they never managed to contact their client -- VERONA (AFP)
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