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Herberts Cukurs, "The Butcher of Latvia" (17 May 1900 – 23 February 1965) was a Latvian aviator and deputy commander of the Arajs Kommando, the Latvian Auxiliary Police Unit founded by Viktors Arājs, which carried out the worst mass murders of Latvian Jews in the Holocaust. Although Cukurs never stood trial (due to fleeing to Brazil and changing his name), multiple Holocaust survivors' accounts, including the testimony of Zelma Shepshelovitz, credibly link him to war crimes and crimes against humanity. After being identified by a local Holocaust survivor in Brazil, who tried to alert authorities after seeing Cukurs' face on the cover a Brazilian magazine, Cukurs was investigated and ultimately assassinated in 1965 during capture by Nazi hunter operatives from Mossad, the Israeli intelligence service. One of the Mossad agents who killed Cukurs, "Künzle," and a journalist, Gad Shimron, authored a book on the experience, The Execution of the Hangman of Riga, in which they referred to Cukurs as the "Butcher of Latvia." The term was later picked up by several sources.
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| Born |
17 May 1900 Liepāja, Courland Governorate, Russian Empire
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| Died |
23 February 1965 (aged 64) Shangrilá, Uruguay
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| Zodiac | Taurus |
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