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MAXINE McKEW: Back home now, and after months of deliberation by Australian authorities, Federal Police arrested an alleged war criminal in Perth last Friday. Charles Zentai, an 83-year-old man who came from Hungary over 50 years ago, is accused of the murder of a young Jewish Hungarian civilian in 1944. To now, Australia has had little success in dealing with alleged perpetrators of the crimes of the Holocaust. But now the Australian Government has chosen to act after Hungary applied for Mr Zentai's extradition to face charges back at the scene of the crime. The attempted extradition follows the failure of the last such case when the alleged criminal Conrad Kalejs died in Melbourne before the case was completed. Mick O'Donnell reports from Perth.
MICK O'DONNELL: Charles Zentai was a quiet and slightly pathetic figure when he faced court and the east Perth police lock-up on Friday night. He'd forgotten to bring his passport to court and had to wait several hours for his lawyer to collect it before he could be released on bail. Outside the Perth Magistrate's Court, his lawyer said his client would fight the extradition.
MICHAEL BOWDEN, DEFENCE LAWYER: There is no doubt that the allegations are denied and that will be dealt with in the court in due course.
MICK O'DONNELL: The court is hearing an application from the Hungarian government for Charles Zentai to be deported to Budapest to face charges of murder.
SENATOR CHRIS ELLISON, JUSTICE MINISTER: He's not facing any charge in Australia. He is of course facing charges in Hungary and that relates to the murder of a young Jewish man in the closing stages of World War II.
MICK O'DONNELL: Until he was tracked down by the Nazi hunters from Israel's Simon Wiesenthal Centre earlier this year, Charles Zentai lived quietly in the Perth suburb of Willeton. The centre gave evidence to the Hungarian government alleging Zentai had murdered a 19-year-old Jewish Hungarian, Peter Balasz, near the end of the war.
SENATOR CHRIS ELLISON: My decision to agree to the request for extradition is not a judgment in any way on the case against Mr Zentai, and can I stress that Mr Zentai is entitled as any other Australian as to a presumption of innocence.
MICK O'DONNELL: The survivors of the Jewish Holocaust, like the alleged perpetrators, are now in their final years. But many, like Hungarian born Sydney man John Weiner, maintain their rage and passion for justice.
JOHN WEINER, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: To me, it's gratifying that they caught him. Because a murderer, a cruel person, a person who wrongs another, must take his punishment, whatever punishment is proscribed by the relevant authorities.
MICK O'DONNELL: John Weiner and his family were among many Hungarian Jews who were arrested by Hungarian authorities when their country was occupied by Nazi Germany.
JOHN WEINER: And there, through eight hours, they bashed him with boxing gloves, a defenceless, poor boy, and you bleed, and you cry, and you beg for mercy, and there is no, no mercy. Nothing. You get more blows till you don't know what's happening any more, and end up in a heap, in a bloodied heap of human flesh.
MICK O'DONNELL: Zentai, serving in the Hungarian army, is alleged to have been involved in rounding up Jews who had previously escaped the Nazi purges. Witnesses claim that in 1944 Zentai grabbed the 19-year-old Balazs from a tram, and with other soldiers beat and killed him before throwing his body into the Danube River. John Weiner has been translating some of the witness statements against him.
JOHN WEINER: Then Zentai said to these boys, "How do you like this music?", referring to the barely audible, inarticulate noises that that poor Peter could still make as the blood flooded his lungs. They didn't have to be cruel. They didn't have to be inhumane. It was the individual's disposition and his thirst for power, whatever power it was.
MICK O'DONNELL: What's not in dispute is that Karoly Zentai, who later anglicised his first name to Charles, arrived in Australia in 1950 on the passenger ship 'Fairsea', bringing with him his wife and two sons. By 1955 he had received Australian citizenship. But it's the document Zentai filled in for his citizenship application that's at the heart of the case against him. This excerpt obtained by the 'Australian' newspaper gives his time of departure from Hungary as March 1945. That sharply contradicts his family's recent claims he left there in 1944, just before Peter Balasz was murdered.
MICHAEL BOWDEN: The extradition will be challenged on a on a number of bases, not only the legal and formal requirements but also the manner in which the original evidence they're relying on was obtained.
MICK O'DONNELL: Charles Zentai's lawyer has told the ABC there are doubts about the authenticity of documents and witness statements.
MICHAEL BOWDEN: As you'll appreciate, it goes back to 1945, and there are integrity issues over the manner in which the evidence was obtained.
MICK O'DONNELL: Whatever the merits of the case against Charles Zentai, it's likely to be many months before he ever gets to trial back in Hungary. International law expert Professor Tim McCormack predicts a year at least.
PROFESSOR TIM McCORMACK: Assuming the magistrate decides against Mr Zentai, then there are a number of avenues of appeal that could actually spread the process out over 12 months, 18 months.
MICK O'DONNELL: It was just such delays which thwarted the case against Conrad Kalejs, the alleged Latvian war criminal. He died aged 88 in a Melbourne nursing home in 2001, before extradition proceedings against him were completed, a result which angered Australian Jewish figures at the time.
NINA BESSAT, COUNCIL OF AUSTRALIAN JEWRY: If the person is still of sound mind and in good health, well, go after him, yes, but don't leave it until they're on their deathbed.
MICK O'DONNELL: Charles Zentai, who's 83, was well able to walk into court on Friday but his lawyer told the court he'd been hospitalised twice with heart problems. During the long process of the Kalejs case, the Australian Democrats called for such cases to be heard in Australia, to avoid the delay of extradition, a call repeated today by West Australian Senator Andrew Murray.
SENATOR ANDREW MURRAY, AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRATS: Well, the question is the speed of process. Really, what you want to have happen is justice, wherever justice can be found, and the difficulty with the current process is it's slow. Justice is often regarded as blindfolded, but justice also has their legs cut off and when you get old people who might be infirm, who are accused, that process of appeal and delay can be - can result in justice denied.
PROFESSOR TIM McCORMACK: It's a very, very difficult thing to prosecute someone especially when those alleged crimes occurred on the other side of the world. The whole question of reliability of evidence, but also actually bringing the evidence to Australia, it's very complicated, very expensive.
MICK O'DONNELL: Zentai's lawyer, Michael Bowden, has told the court there's no risk of his client fleeing the process.
MICHAEL BOWDEN: He's been in Australia for in excess of 50 years. He's known about this for some considerable period of time and obviously he doesn't represent a flight risk as the magistrate has found.
MICK O'DONNELL: But today at Sydney's Jewish Museum, survivor of the Hungarian Holocaust John Weiner spoke for many who've seen the worst that humanity has to offer.
JOHN WEINER: A man who knows no mercy, does he deserve mercy? A man who destroys, does he deserve compassion?
Australian Broadcasting Corporation,
Broadcast: 11/07/2005
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