BERLIN — The hunt for Aribert Ferdinand Heim, a Nazi fugitive and concentration-camp doctor, has officially come to a close, German authorities said Friday, after they determined that the man known as Dr. Death for his unnecessary operations had died in Egypt in 1992.
A regional court in Baden-Baden, Heim’s last known residence in Germany, said it had suspended the criminal investigation because “no doubts remained” that the fugitive who eluded the authorities for decades had died of cancer in Cairo in 1992.
The New York Times and the German television station ZDF reported in 2009 that Heim had escaped justice by hiding in North Africa. An old dusty briefcase full of letters, handwritten notes about the case against him and medical records corroborated the accounts of Egyptians who knew him there.
This year, Heim’s lawyer presented additional papers, including an Egyptian driver’s license with a photo of the German under the name Tarek Hussein Farid and a certificate confirming his conversion to Islam and name change.
Front Section, Pages 10 on 09/23/2012