You are now listening to true murder, the most shocking killers in true crime history and the authors that have written about

them Gacy, Bundy, Dahmer, the Nightstalker, BTK. Every week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and

infamous killers in true crime history. True murder with your host journalist and

author Dan Zuthanski.

Good evening.

By the time of her execution at 36, Maria Mandel had achieved the highest

rank possible for a woman in the third right as head overseer of the women's camp at Auschwitz-Berkenau, she was personally

responsible for the murders of thousands and for the torture and suffering of countless

more.

In this riveting biography, Susan J. Eishide explores how Maria Mandel regarded locally as a nice girl from a good family

came to embody the very worst of humanity.

Born in 1912 in the scenic Austrian village of Meenskirchen,

Maria enjoyed a happy childhood with loving parents who later watched in anguish as their grown daughter

rose through the Nazi system. Mandel's light mirrors the period in which she lived, turbulent,

violent, and suffused with paradoxes at Auschwitz-Birchenau.

She founded a notable women's orchestra and adopted several children from the transports, only

to lead them to the gas chambers when her interest waned.

After the war, Maria was arrested for crimes against humanity.

Following a public trial attended by the international press, she was hanged in 1948.

For two decades, Aishide has excavated the details of Mandel's life story, drawing on archival testimonies, speaking to dozens of witnesses, and spending

time with Mandel's community of friends and neighbors who shared their memories, as well as

those handed down in their families.

...