3 Found Guilty in Sale of Fake ‘Hitler Diaries’

A Hamburg court today convicted three West Germans in connection with the $3.1-million sale of phony “Hitler Diaries” to Stern news magazine, a deal prosecutors called the biggest literary hoax of the century.

The court sentenced self-confessed diaries forger Konrad Kujau to four years and six months in prison for a fraud and forgery conviction, and former Stern reporter Gerd Heidemann received four years and eight months for fraud in procuring the 60 volumes for the magazine.

The five-judge panel gave Kujau’s girlfriend, Edith Lieblang, 44, eight months probation for receiving stolen property--some of his earnings from the forgeries.

Under the West German legal system, a person found guilty of a crime is sentenced in the same court session, and defendants can be credited for prison time already served.

‘Investigative Custody’

Heidemann, 53, and Kujau, 47, have been held in “investigative custody” for two years. Prosecutors had asked for a seven-year sentence for Heidemann, six years for Kujau, and a one-year suspended sentence for Lieblang.

Prosecutors claimed during the trio’s 10-month trial that Heidemann kept at least $600,000 of the $3.1 million Stern gave him to buy the volumes and that Kujau got $500,000 of the money.

The three defendants claimed to have been duped by one another about the origin of the volumes and of the money paid for them.

During a recess, Prosecutor Dietrich Klein was asked whether he was happy with the outcome. He replied, “There’s no reason to be dissatisfied.”

Appeals Planned

Attorneys for both men said they would appeal the sentences, probably within a week.

Prosecutors admit that they have not established what happened to Stern’s $3.1 million. They allege that Heidemann used his share of the money to finance repairs to his yacht, the Caren II, which formerly belonged to Nazi air force chief Hermann Goering, and to buy vacation houses in Spain and jewels and cars for his wife. Heidemann said he gave the money to the Nazi memorabilia dealer for the volumes.

Before the sentence was pronounced, Kujau, a Nazi artifacts collector, told reporters: “I won’t get off. I wrote the things--didn’t I?”