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13 May 1945 German deserter execution
Illegal execution of German deserters by German officers
13 May 1945 German deserter execution
The 13 May 1945 German deserter execution occurred five days after the capitulation of Nazi Germany along with the Wehrmacht armed forces in World War II, when an illegal court martial, composed of the captured and disarmed German officers kept under Allied guard in Amsterdam, Netherlands, imposed a death sentence upon two former German deserters from the Kriegsmarine, Bruno Dorfer and Rainer Beck (sailor), a half-Jewish conscript who had deserted to avoid being killed. The show trial occurred in an abandoned Ford Motor Company assembly plant outside Amsterdam, which at the time was a prisoner-of-war camp run by the Canadian Army. The Nazi German prisoners of war formed a firing squad which carried out the sentence. They were supplied with captured German rifles and a three-ton truck by the Seaforth Highlanders of Canada, and escorted by a platoon of Canadian soldiers led by Captain Robert K. Swinton. Under a dubious interpretation of international law, Canadian military authorities permitted...
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