David Irving Gets 3 Years

Mon, Feb 20, 2006 at 1:56:38 pm PST

Holocaust denier David Irving (who hates to be called a Holocaust denier) has been sentenced to three years in an Austrian prison: Holocaust Denier Gets Three Years in Jail.

VIENNA, Austria - Right-wing British historian David Irving was sentenced to three years in prison Monday after admitting to an Austrian court that he denied the Holocaust — a crime in the country where Hitler was born.

Irving, who pleaded guilty and then insisted during his one-day trial that he now acknowledged the Nazis’ World War II slaughter of 6 million Jews, had faced up to 10 years behind bars. Before the verdict, Irving conceded he had erred in contending there were no gas chambers at the Auschwitz concentration camp. “I made a mistake when I said there were no gas chambers at Auschwitz,” Irving testified, at one point expressing sorrow “for all the innocent people who died during the Second World War.”

Irving, stressing he only relied on primary sources, said he came across new information in the early 1990’s from top Nazi officials — including personal documents belonging to Adolf Eichmann — that led him to rethink certain previous assertions. But despite his apparent epiphany, Irving, 67, maintained he had never questioned the Holocaust.

“I’ve never been a Holocaust denier and I get very angry when I’m called a Holocaust denier,” he said.