The murder of Jochen Peiper, France 1976

Discussion in 'Axis Units' started by Poor Old Spike, Jan 29, 2012.

  1. stolpi

    stolpi Well-Known Member

    Ruimteaapje - You mean the murderers are known ... was anyone convicted for the act?
     
  2. canuck

    canuck Closed Account

    Seems a little sloppy for the Mossad. They are usually more professional and tidy.
     
  3. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    That's my feeling on the Peiper killing these days too.
    We'll never know for certain, but it smacks to me of, 'something' that escalated beyond what was originally intended.
    Likely not helped by my seeing him as somebody who would hardly back down from anybody with a weapon, firebomb or pistol, regardless of his age.

    Any newer research on it been done recently? Or is the ATB article still the go-to basic coverage?
    I dare say not the easiest of deaths to re-open any official French investigation into (understatement).
     
  4. Harry Ree

    Harry Ree Very Senior Member

    For any researchers,there are four voluminous files held by the French Police in their Police Judiciaire at Dijon on the murder of Peiper. However, It is likely that anyone who can contribute to a review of the case would be hampered by the lack of living witnesses.

    His present in France became a national issue in early July 1976 and was referred to President Gistcard d'Estang who was criticised for allowing a known Nazi war criminal to reside in France.At this point Peiper knew his residence permit would not be renewed when it was due to expire on 27 February 1977 having being granted on 27 April 1972.

    Consequently from early July 1976 Peiper made arrangements to return to Germany.His wife left for Germany on 13 July but events beyond his control, overwhelmed him in the early hours of Bastille Day 1976.
     
  5. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA

    Why wasn't he hung in 1946? Obviously guilty and a true scum. Just because he had friends in high places? (One of whom was Himmler who at least croaked himself)
     
  6. Basically yes, but the friends in high places were American senators like McCarthy and Van Roden who benefited politically from questioning the methods used by the mostly Jewish interogation team. Calling them "unamerican" and accusing them of using torture, mock trials and other illegal ways to get confessions. These accusations could never truely be substantiated but reasonable doubt led to the dead penalties been reduced to life imprisonment and later commuted to time served.
     
  7. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA

    I was thinking of people like Ferry Porsche and Heinz Guderian
     
  8. Certainly Porsche and Guderian were not the kind of people who could turn back a death sentence. Nope, it was mainly due to people like the above mentioned Joe McCarthy who saw an opportunistic chance to profile himself as the defender against "unamerican" behaviour (much in line with his later witch hunts against "communistst") and Judge Edward L. Van Roden from Pennsylvania who wanted to please his German-American voters. Google the commission chaired by Texas Supreme Court Judge Gordon. A. Simpson and the subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Armed Services chaired by senator Raymond E. Baldwin for full details on how support for the "Malmédy Boys" grew in Washington DC which led to suspension of the death penalties by Secretary of the Army Kenneth C. Royall and later commuted to life imprisonment.
     
  9. JohnS

    JohnS Senior Member

    Very interesting. I have to get a copy of this issue.
     
  10. Van Roden had earlier endorsed “for all Americans” the book ‘The Crime of our Age’ by Ludwig A. Fritch which advocated the thesis that the Jews and the Anglo-Saxons had succeeded in unifying the nations of the world into an unholy alliance in order to destroy the German ‘Holy Reich’, which Fritch claimed had been the defender, guardian and protector of Christianity and the white race.
     
  11. Most if not all answers are given by Danny S. Parker in chapter 24 "Ghosts of the Past" of his book "Hitler's Warrior". Highly recommended!He even cites from the lengthy statement made on the 31st of July 1976 at the Gendarmerie in Vesoul by the man who confessed to driving the men who carried out the attack to the Peiper residence. The Gendarme had arrested him after they had been informed by a young man who overheard the murderers saying they had "killed the SS man". Having made attempts to harrass Peiper before, they had decided to go to his house with crude home-made molotov cocktails and an old 6.35mm revolver to deal with Peiper's dogs. They parked near Ketelhut's mill and from behind the wheel of his car the waiting suspect, 21-year old Daniel D from the town of Gray, had heared gunshots and saw the first flames sprout up from the house. He was relieved to see the other three return to the car. Upon jumping into the car one of them shouted: "It's done, it's torched!" The four then roared off and went home. The three others were also brought in: they had no jobs, drank excessively and had records for petty theft. The police described them as "young crooks". They found evidence that they were also responsible for breaking into Peiper's mailbox on the 25th of June and Daniel D confessed to driving to Traves in the evening ot the 1st of July to harass Peiper, shouting insults and trowing rocks but were scared off bt the sight of Peiper wielding a hunting rifle. There was however a big shortcoming: due to lack of witnesses and incriminating physical evidence, all hinged on the confession made by Daniel D but the boy was deemed psychologically unstable. After a night in custody Daniel clumsily recanted his statement the following morning and by the end of the day the police had to let them go. Despite strong circumstantial evidence, without D's confession there was nothing on which to hold them. "After that", the chief inspector ventured, "everyone in the village clammed up" Nobody was going to talk." He dutifully followed dozens of other leads but they had nothing more. The inspector was however convinced that Ketelhut knew more: even with a sleeping pill, how could someone sleep through barking dogs and a half-dozen gunshot blasts fired not 200 metres away? With open windows! Before the police could interview him, Ketelhut left for Germany and when he returned two weeks later he even denied knowing anything about Peiper's military past. They did not believe him and even put it to the test: they fired Peiper's hunting rifle from the remains of his balcony and by the time the last shot was fired a breathless and anxious Ketelhut came rushing up to Peiper's burned-out house to find out what was going on. He changed his story: he had heard the gunshots that night but now claimed he had decided it must be hunters. Ketelhut stuck to this new version, was cornered by the inspector: if he had heard the shots, why had he not helped Peiper as he had promised him earlier? Ketelhut stammered that the man who had distributed the "Peiper SS" leaflets in Traves, Paul Cacheux, had assured him that he had nothing to fear from them. With that he hurried back to Germany. Years after the inspector retired in 1990, Daniel D called the police in Dijon. He wanted to speak to the inspector, said he had inportant information about the Peiper case. His voice, the operator recalled, had sounded tortured, even desperate. At that time Daniel worked as a shepherd and it took some time for the retired inspector to find his address. Daniel never responded.
     
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  12. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    according to Kershaw in The Longest Winter page 291.


    In 1940 , he had been enchanted by an area around the Langres Plateau in the southeast. Back then , Peiper had helped a French POW from the region , a man named Gauthier , return from Germany to his family in France.
    In 1969 , an ever-grateful Gauthier sold Peiper property in the village of Traves, eight miles west of the nearest town, Vesoul, and he and his wife moved there.
     
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  13. Retired police inspector Roger Lavaux, who led the investigations into the murder of Joachim Peiper, passed away at his home in Dijon two weeks ago on September 9th, aged 95.
     

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