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The Forum > General Discussion > A charming pensioner stands aaccused of murder..

A charming pensioner stands aaccused of murder..

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Dear TRTL,

I fully agree with you - the man's so called 'charm,' is totally irrelevant. I deeply regret taking that headline from the magazine.

However, I still do not agree with the case being brought to trial - on suspect evidence - because no matter how good his legal team may be, if there's a hidden agenda driving all of this - the man won't stand a chance.

I remember the case of Nikolai Tolstoy in which he tried to get to the bottom of the handing over of some 40,000 Cossacks and White Russians, including many women and children that ended in his writing the book,"The Minister and the Massacres.'

His story was of a cover up operation lasting forty years which included the deliberate keeping in ignorance of both Winston Churchill and the British and US governments of the day, the removal or destruction of official government papers; a conscious attempt to place the blame for the massacres on Field Marshal Alexander, and concerted efforts made to avoid the full facts ever coming to light.

Tolstoy had all the evidence, the best legal advice, but no hope of winning. There was a hidden agenda.

I'm sure the same applies to this case of the Perth pensioner.
Posted by Foxy, Monday, 16 June 2008 4:09:54 PM
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I'd hate to have to try and defend myslef against allegations about something from that far in the past. I'd hate at his age to have to try and deal with a serious legal case in a country which I'd not been in for around 58 years. If he is innocent the hooro of what he is facing would be overwhelming.

Is there evidence that this man has been in hiding or has he been living here under his real identity (or if he's anglicised his name did the authorities have his original name?

If there is evidence that he has been involved in a long term deception to hide then I'd say thats the risk you take but if he has been here in the open then the elapsed time period seems unreasonable.

War criminals should not escape but unless there is clear evidence that this man has been hiding I'd rather take the risk of letting one off than the risk of destroying the last years of a man who may well be innocent.

R0bert
Posted by R0bert, Monday, 16 June 2008 7:19:48 PM
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Dear Robert,

According to the article in 'The Age's - Good Weekend,' magazine, June 14, 2008, and I quote:

"...No one was more surprised than he to learn of the extradition request..."I never knew about it," he says. "They didn't contact me at all." And it wasn't as if he was in hiding: his address in Germany was registered, to entitle him to food rations, and he migrated to Australia under his own name...He was listed in the Perth telephone directory...

Hardly the behaviour of a fugitive, says Ernie, who is convinced that his father could not have killed Petr Balazs on November 8. Why? Because he and his unit had left Budapest the previous day..."Some dates you don't forget," says Zentai, who contends that Nagy and commander Bela Mader WERE in Budapest on November 8, having stayed behind to secure the barracks. They and their families caught a bus to rejoin the unit a couple of days later.

Could they have committed the crime? "I don't know," he says. "I'm really not certain. But it is a possibility." Witnesses at the Nagy trial testified that Mader WAS present when Peter was dying..."

As I've stated in my previous posts Robert, this case is not cut and dry.
Posted by Foxy, Monday, 16 June 2008 10:36:45 PM
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Easytimes “Col Rouge – You did not say if support having Jewish war criminals bought to justice! Well what is your stance?”

My view is simple,

if someone is suspected of a crime and if, on the balance of the available evidence, there is sufficient a basis for an appropriate authority to prosecute, then the means to determine someone’s guilt or innocence is to place it before a jury and I see no sense in the Hungarian government going to the expense of a trial without sufficient evidence; rather than pretend that a review of the newspaper reports here on OLO is sufficient an enquiry to exonerate anyone.

Foxy “Col Rouge tried to point out - Hungary is no longer under the Soviet yoke. However, if that's true - why are they relying on evidence from that period?”

I did not try, I clearly did point it out.

As to the evidence, the Hungarian authority of today is prosecuting a crime which predated the soviet occupation period, which is the period to which the evidence refers.

” The accusations occurred because those people were active in the West in anti-Soviet activities.”

That sounds like “innocence due to possible conspiracy theory” and might hold some validity if the soviet puppet regime still held the reigns.

“As Simon Wiesenthal declared when he retired in 2003, the time for pursuing those responsible for the Holocaust was over.”

I do not think that is within Simon Wiesenthal “gift” to make.

“However, I still do not agree with the case being brought to trial - on suspect evidence - because no matter how good his legal team may be, if there's a hidden agenda driving all of this - the man won't stand a chance.”

“if there is a hidden agenda”

– what “if” there is no hidden agenda, should the fate of his victim be forgotten and ignored?

Btw I asked you previously “should there be a statute of limitations on murder and if so, how long?”

You have not responded
Posted by Col Rouge, Tuesday, 17 June 2008 11:45:51 AM
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Dear Col Rouge,

I can see that we are not going to achieve anything constructive in further discussions of this case. My knowledge of the history of Hungary differs from yours considerably. It wasn't until the 1990s that multiparty elections were held in that country - the same applies to the other "free" countries that once belonged to the Soviet bloc - where today supposedly democracies exist. As the saying goes, "Same bloke, different hat." And, getting a 'fair trial,'
according to their rules - would be rather difficult.

Anyway, Thank you for your comments and contributions to this thread.
I stand by the views that I've expressed here, and the reasons for them. I don't of course expect everyone to agree with me.

I'd like to Thank all the posters who have contributed - It has been an interesting discussion. Some very good points have been raised.
Posted by Foxy, Tuesday, 17 June 2008 2:32:13 PM
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Foxy "As the saying goes, "Same bloke, different hat." And, getting a 'fair trial,'
according to their rules - would be rather difficult."

That is a very cynical assumption.

Considering the events of 1956 (oh I do know a little about Hungarian history) and the sense of nationhood which many Hungarians express, I think the last person to hold favour in Budapest would be of the "Old Guard".

As for the "charming pensioner" I am sure when they eventually bury Ivan Milat, someone will observe how genteel a man he is, layed out in the coffin (a closure which he denied many of his victims).
Posted by Col Rouge, Tuesday, 17 June 2008 4:11:53 PM
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