Franz Stangle, born in 1908, is probably best known for his euthanasia programs as a part of the Holocaust ‘cleansing’ solution. He worked with the SS in Austria during Operation Reinhard, and was eventually tried for murdering more than 900,000 people during his duty as a Nazi SS commandant. Stangle’s nickname was “The White Death”, perpetuating his part in the T4 Euthanasia programs that were taking place during the 1940s in Europe. He eventually became a leader of many centers that were responsible for killing mentally and physically disabled people because they were of no value or use to the Nazi party.
Stangle started working in extermination camps during the early 1940s, as appointed by Himmler, the leader of the SS. Although he was initially told he was working at a supply camp, he discovered a hidden gas chamber, at which point he was given permission to kill Jews if they weren’t working hard enough. As time went on, he began working at other extermination camps and eventually became the administrator of Sobibor, the original camp he was assigned to. More than 100,000 Jews were killed at this camp under his rule. His wife confronted him about his work at one point, but he dismissed it and told her he wasn’t associated with whatever she had heard.
Franz Stangle went on to work at Treblinka when it was built, where it is said that they could kill up to 15,000 people per day. He was then transferred to Trieste before falling ill and returning to Vienna in 1945. Stangle evaded arrest at the end of the war by changing his identity and fleeing the country. He was briefly detained for his suspected involvement, but escaped and fled to Italy and then to Syria, where he lived until 1951. At that point, he moved his family to Brazil and carried on a life for many years.
Even though the authorities knew of his involvement in
the Holocaust, a warrant wasn’t issued against him until 1961. Stangle was registered under his legal name in Sao Paulo at the Austrian consulate, but it still took 6 years before he was found by Simon Wiesenthal, a known Nazi hunter. He was extradited to West Germany and tried for the murder of 900,000 people, to which he admitted being responsible but justified his actions. He was sentenced to life in prison, and died of heart failure in 1971.