Ex-Stasi officer jailed over 1974 Berlin border killing

BERLIN: A former East German secret police officer was sentenced to 10 years in jail in a landmark ruling on Monday for shooting dead a Polish man trying to flee to the West 50 years ago.

The sentence, almost 35 years after the Berlin Wall fell, marks the first time a former Stasi officer has been convicted of a homicide committed on duty, according to historians. The Berlin court found Martin Manfred Naumann, 80, guilty of murder for shooting Czeslaw Kukuczka in the back at close range as he sought to flee through Berlin´s Friedrichstrasse border point in 1974.