Abstract (eng)
What started with the so called „euthanasia“ of infants, the murder of mentally and physically disabled babies, infants and adolescents, developed against the background of war conditions to a death bringing helix that culminated in the Holocaust. Even the “Reichsgau” Vienna was not spared from the measures of “euthanasia”, as there were willing agents, and ideologically convinced perpetrators at command, which executed the program of extinction in the mental institutions “Am Steinhof” and “Am Spiegelgrund”. Dr. Erwin Jekelius, who became decisively engaged in his activity during the first phase of the “euthanasia” in Vienna, was a representative for the involved medical practitioners of the NS regime, which advanced to co- and main-perpetrators during the program. Due to his roles and positions at various levels, Dr. Jekelius collaborated closely with the “euthanasia”-head office in Berlin, and can, therefore be numbered among the closest circle of people in charge of the “euthanasia” program. Under his area of responsibility as “T4”-referee and “Spiegelgrunddirektor”, approximately 4000 adults and about 100 infants lost their lives. Understandably, the Viennese populace called him the “mass murderer of Steinhof” and Dr. Viktor Frankl named him “the devil in a white coat”. He was wanted as war criminal, was arrested by SMERSCH in 1945, and was finally sentenced to 25 years imprisonment in Moscow. He died of bladder cancer in the Vladimirski-prison in 1952. The perpetrator passed away, but his deeds remain.