Israelis sentenced for theft of Auschwitz mementos

Couple stopped at airport after being found with items from prisoner belongings storage at Nazi camp; given 2-years suspended sentence.

By REUTERS
Auschwitz 311 (photo credit: REUTERS/Kacper Pempel)
Auschwitz 311
(photo credit: REUTERS/Kacper Pempel)
WARSAW - An Israeli couple have been given suspended jail sentences for the theft of historic artifacts from the former Nazi death camp Auschwitz, Poland's PAP news agency quoted a prosecutor as saying on Saturday.
"They have voluntarily accepted a two-year suspended jail sentence and agreed to pay a mandatory contribution towards the preservation of monuments," Deputy District Prosecutor Mariusz Slomka said, without specifying the amount.
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After all formalities are dealt with, the 60-year-old man and his 57-year-old wife will be free to leave Poland, he said.
The couple had been charged earlier on Saturday with the theft of mementos of particular cultural importance, an offense that carries a maximum 10-year jail sentence.
They spent Friday night in jail after border guards at Krakow airport caught them trying to take several Auschwitz artifacts out of the country, Slomka told PAP.
Krakow police spokesman Dariusz Nowak said the couple took nine items including spoons, knives, scissors and porcelain bottle stoppers they had found in a storage room of prisoner belongings during a visit to Auschwitz, now a museum.
It was the third such incident this year at the site in southern Poland, Nowak said.
An estimated 1.1 million people, mostly Jews from Poland and elsewhere in Europe, perished at Auschwitz during World War Two.