Lecca, Radu, 1890-1980

Radu D. Lecca (February 15, 1890–1980) was a Romanian spy, journalist, civil servant and convicted war criminal. A World War I veteran who served a prison term for espionage in France during the early 1930s, he was a noted supporter of antisemitic concepts and, after 1933, an agent of influence for Nazi Germany. While becoming a double agent for Romania's Special Intelligence Service (SSI), Lecca was involved in fascist politics, gained in importance during World War II and the successive dictatorships, and eventually grew close to Conducător Ion Antonescu. After 1941, Lecca was Commissioner, later Commissioner General, tasked with solving the "Jewish Question" in Romania, sharing Romania's responsibility for the Holocaust. Advised by the special German envoys Manfred Freiherr von Killinger and Gustav Richter and acting with Antonescu's consent, he established the Central Jewish Office (Centrala Evreiască, CE) through which he persecuted, exploited and extorted the Romanian Jewish community, whose existence was threatened by deportations into Transnistria. The system he supervised was notoriously corrupt, with many of the funds extorted being used for the personal benefit of Lecca or his political associates. Commissioner Lecca was also instrumental in negotiating the Final Solution's application in Romania, a plan which was eventually abandoned, while considering mass emigration to Palestine in exchange for payments. After the August 1944 Coup removed Antonescu and aligned Romania with the Allies, Lecca was among the high-ranking Romanian politicians arrested and transported to the Soviet Union. Upon his 1946 return, Lecca was Antonescu's co-defendant in a People's Tribunal case, and was condemned to death. His sentence was commuted into life imprisonment and later reduced by the communist regime. After his release, Lecca wrote memoirs which make various controversial claims, and which minimize his and Antonescu's participation in Holocaust-related crimes.