CSI SUNDAY is a new weekend feature on Killing Killers, presenting the top crime story in the past seven days. Today's spotlight is inspired by the NSA spy scandal:
The crime scene in Nazi Germany has long ago been cleansed, but because it was so vast and so bloody major forensic evidence and felons still continue to crop up every once in awhile.
In fact, two significant Third Reich finds made the news recently.
The first concerned a Nazi diary from one of Adolph Hitler's right-hand men. The second was the discovery of one of the most vile, violent, and reviled of Nazi collaborators and SS commanders, living in, of all places, the state of Minnesota.
Secret Nazi Diary found in New York
Nazi head honcho, Alfred Rosenberg, was Adolph Hitler's respected aid and advisor, and, as such, intricately involved in some of the world's worse atrocities, including the planning and execution of tens of millions of Jews, gypsies, Europeans, POWs, and resistance fighters.
He also kept a fairly detailed diary of the day-to-day operations of the Third Reich which for decades historians have known about, but was somehow hidden away.
This week the private pennings of hanged Nazi propagandist and foreign affairs minister Rosenberg finally resurfaced -- in excellent condition -- and were handed over to federal authorities in New York City who verified their authenticity.
Thereafter the papers will be delivered to their rightful owner again: The United States Holocaust Museum.
Experts there say Rosenberg's diary is a remarkable and unprecedented literary find that sheds new light on the inside workings and personalities of the highest ranking Nazis of all time, and the madman who led them.
Nazi SS officer living in retirement in Minneapolis
Michael Karkoc, a 94-year-old Ukranian immigrant and naturalized American citizen living in Minnesota since 1949, has a very infamous past, prosecutors from America, Poland and Germany claim.
He's the former Nazi commander who served in two units that were on the U.S. blacklist -- the Ukranian Self-Defense Legion, accused of burning whole villages of women and children, and the notorious Galician Division of the Nazi SS.
Hunted by those seeking to arrest him for the sins of war and crimes against humanity, Karkoc clandestinely emigrated to the United States in the late 1940s, mainly by lying about his military service.
Hunted by those seeking to arrest him for the sins of war and crimes against humanity, Karkoc clandestinely emigrated to the United States in the late 1940s, mainly by lying about his military service.
He then became a naturalized citizen in 1959. But that legal standing and the protections that come with it can easily be stripped away now, authorities say, since committing fraud when filing an application for citizenry is grounds for deportation.
Minnesota Nazi, Michael Karkoc, made the case against himself even stronger when, in the 1990s, he published memoirs claiming to be a founding member of the Ukranian Self-Defense Legion.
Nevertheless, family members vehemently deny that Karkoc was one of Hitler's main and most malevolent henchmen. And legal experts are warning that, even if he is, it'll be a long drawn out process to prosecute him for his numerous offenses.
By which time the already ancient Karkoc will likely be dead.
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