‘Bookkeeper of Auschwitz’ Oskar Groening dies without serving a day in prison

Oskar Groening, the former Auschwitz guard convicted in his 90s for his role in the murder of 300,000 Hungarian Jews at the concentration camp, has died in Germany, writes the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

Reports of his death surfaced on Monday, though the German publication der Spiegel reported that he died Friday and authorities had not yet received his death certificate. He was 96.

Groening, who was sentenced to four years in prison for his crimes, died without spending a day serving his term. The man known as the “Bookkeeper of Auschwitz” was convicted in July 2015.

He had been expected to enter prison at the end of January, but the continued wrangling over the state of his health kept him from beginning to serve his sentence.

“The death of Oskar Groening just before he was scheduled to begin to serve his sentence in a German jail following his conviction three years ago for accessory to murder is quite unfortunate, at least on a symbolic level,” Efraim Zuroff, director of the Israel office of the Simon Wiesenthal Center and an expert in Nazi war criminals, said in a statement issued