Human Rights A Day

Vienna apologizes for World War II deaths of disabled children.Between 1940 and 1945, children with mental and physical disabilities were sent to the Am Spiegelgrund children's clinic in Vienna, Austria. There, the Nazi program known as "Lebensunwertes Leben," or life unworthy of life, experimented on them before killing them with overdoses of barbiturates. More horrifying, the clinic kept the brains of at least 789 of the children to continue research on them until 1998. The director of the clinic, Dr. Ernst Illing, was hanged as a war criminal in 1946, but Dr. Heinrich Gross managed to return to the clinic in 1948 after being merely detained by the Russians. He built up his practice and reputation as a renowned neurologist and received the state medal for services to Austria. In 1979, a doctor named Werner Vogt accused Gross of involvement in the hideous experiments, but instead of believing Vogt, officials convicted Vogt of slander. Gross’ complicity was eventually revealed and Vogt was freed, but it took