Melbourne

Friday, November 12, 1999

Push to Free Jailed Holocaust Revisionist

By PENELOPE DEBELLE ADELAIDE AND GEOFF KITNEY

Holocaust revisionists in Australia are organising an international appeal to raise $5000 bail to secure the early release of Dr Fredrick Toben from a German jail.

The acting head of the ultra-right Adelaide Institute, Mr Geoffrey Muirden, said thousands of dollars had already been raised to pay Dr Toben's lawyer, Mr Ludwig Bock, for his defence of the German-born Holocaust revisionist on hate speech charges in Mannheim.

Dr Toben, 55, was sentenced to 10 months' jail on Wednesday after a three-day trial in Mannheim in which he was found guilty of charges of incitement, disparagement and insulting the memory of the dead.

Dr Toben, a former Victorian teacher who lives in Adelaide, was arrested in April under German laws designed to prevent Holocaust denial.

Australian Jewish groups said yesterday the conviction was encouraging to all people who support democracy and tolerance. The national vice-president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, Mr Jeremy Jones, said Dr Toben was lucky to escape lightly as the offence carried a maximum penalty of five years' prison.

Mr Jones said Dr Toben must have been trying to call German authorities' bluff or trying to make himself into a martyr by visiting Germany.

"It's encouraging not just to Holocaust survivors but to all people who encourage democracy and tolerance that Germany has in place a criminal offence and they are willing to use the criminal law to punish people who continue the propaganda handiwork of Nazis."

Dr Toben was arrested for challenging the severity of the Holocaust through newsletters and material he posted on the Adelaide Institute's website. The charges were not sustained in relation to the website material, a decision the German hate crimes prosecutor, Mr Hans Klein, said he would challenge.

Mr Klein said the case set a dangerous precedent. The court's decision that it had no power to prosecute over material published in Germany on an Internet site created in Australia was a bad decision that opened up dangerous possibilities, he said.

It would allow the far right in Germany to use its connections with sympathisers in countries such as Australia to pursue its goals of undermining laws in Germany aimed at containing anti-Semitism and preserving the memory of the Holocaust to ensure that such a thing could never again happen.

"It is important to appeal against this court decision," he said.

Because Dr Toben has been in custody since April, the court ruled that he could be released on the payment of a $5000 fine.

Friday, November 12, 1999

Trial sparks Internet racism fears

By GEOFF KITNEY,
Herald Correspondent in Berlin

German authorities fear the trial of an Australian Holocaust revisionist has given the green light for far Right groups to use the Internet to spread their race hate messages.

Former schoolteacher Frederick Toben was charged with illegally distributing anti-Semitic and race hate material in Germany by mail and via the Web site of the Adelaide Institute, of which he is the director.

But the local court in the southern city of Mannheim declined to punish Toben for the information on the Web site, which challenges the historic truth of the Holocaust.

It said it only had to deal with written material distributed in Germany in hard form. The court convicted Toben on charges of inciting racial hatred, of defaming the memory of the dead and of public denial of the Holocaust for material contained in an open letter he sent to political leaders and others in Germany.

As a result, he received a prison sentence of only 10 months, compared with the two years and four months asked for by prosecutor Mr Hans Klein.

Mr Klein said the decision would allow the far Right in Germany to use its connections with sympathisers in countries such as Australia to pursue their goals of undermining laws in Germany aimed at containing anti-Semitism and preserving the memory of the Holocaust to ensure that such a thing could never again happen.

"It is important to appeal against this court decision," he said.

Judge Klaus Kern said there was no doubt that Toben was guilty of denying the Holocaust. There was also no sign that Toben would relent from this behaviour and a jail sentence was required.

But he said the court could only take into account the material which he had physically distributed in Germany. Material published on the Internet was not physically distributed in Germany by Toben. Its distribution depended on an Internet user connecting to Toben's Adelaide site and pulling material from it.

Because Toben has been in custody since April, the court ruled that he could be released on the payment of a $5,000 fine.

Supporters of Toben in the court, including prominent figures of the German far Right, said they would try to raise the funds to secure his release within days.

Court sources said Toben planned to return to Australia immediately.

German citizens convicted of the same crimes have been sentenced to jail terms of two to five years.

Despite what was seen as a relatively light sentence, Toben's lawyer, Mr Ludwig Bock, said he also planned to appeal against the decision.

Mr Bock had refused to present a defence on Toben's behalf because he said he risked being prosecuted on the same charges as Toben. He is waiting the outcome of an appeal against a conviction earlier this year over his defence of another Holocaust revisionist.

Mr Bock said the conviction of Toben without the defence case being presented because of the threat of further legal action was a matter of serious concern.

Meanwhile, Australian Jewish groups welcomed Toben's conviction, saying it was encouraging to all people who support democracy and tolerance.

The national vice-president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, Mr Jeremy Jones, said:

"It's encouraging not just to Holocaust survivors but to all people who encourage democracy and tolerance that Germany has in place a criminal offence and they are willing to use the criminal law to punish people who continue the propaganda handiwork of Nazis."

November 11, 1999

Holocaust Revisionist Convicted

By The Associated Press

MANNHEIM, Germany (AP) -- Australian Holocaust revisionist Frederick Toben was sentenced to 10 months in prison after being convicted by a German judge of denying that the Nazis murdered millions of Jews during World War II -- a crime under German law.

German-born Toben, 55, was found guilty late Wednesday of incitement, slander and insulting the memory of the dead for spreading his theories on the Internet and in pamphlets.

Calling Toben an anti-Semite and neo-Nazi in his closing argument, state prosecutor Hans-Heiko Klein asked for a sentence of two years and four months with parole. The maximum sentence for the charges is five years. Toben's defense lawyer gave no closing argument.

Toben, director of the Adelaide Institute, an Australian organization devoted to questioning the Holocaust, was arrested in April after trying to discuss his ideas with a Mannheim state prosecutor.

He had been traveling through Europe to gather evidence to support his theories and was publishing the diaries of his trip on the Adelaide Institute Web site.

The Executive Council of the Australian Jewry and the Anti-Defamation Commission of B'nai B'rith have accused Toben of trying to intimidate Australian Jews through his Holocaust denial.