Aribert Heim

In the years following his disappearance, Heim was the target of a rapidly escalating manhunt and ever-increasing rewards for his capture. Following his escape there were reported sightings in Latin America, Spain and Africa, as well as formal investigations aimed at bringing him to justice, some of which took place even after he had apparently died in Egypt. The German government offered €150,000 for information leading to his arrest, while the Simon Wiesenthal Center launched Operation Last Chance, a project to assist governments in the location and arrest of suspected Nazi war criminals who are still alive.[21] Tax records prove that, as late as 2001, Heim's lawyer asked the German authorities to refund capital gains taxes levied on him because he was living abroad.[21]

Heim reportedly hid out in South America, Spain and the Balkans, but only his presence in Spain has ever been confirmed.[20] He was alleged to have moved to Spain after fleeing Paysandú, Uruguay, when he was located by the Israeli Mossad. Efraim Zuroff, of the Wiesenthal Center, initiated an active search for his whereabouts,[21] and in late 2005, Spanish police incorrectly determined he was in Palafrugell, Spain.[22] According to El Mundo, Heim had been helped by associates of Otto Skorzeny, who had organised one of the biggest ODESSA bases in Franco's Spain.[23]

Press reports in mid-October 2005 suggested that Heim's arrest by Spanish police was "imminent". Within a few days, however, newer reports suggested that he had successfully evaded capture and had moved either to another part of Spain or to Denmark.[24][25][26][27]

Fredrik Jensen, a Norwegian and a former SS Obersturmführer, was put under police investigation in June 2007, and charged with assisting Heim in his escape. The accusation was denied by Jensen.[28] In July 2007, the Austrian Ministry of Justice declared that it would pay €50,000 for information leading to his arrest and extradition to Austria.[29]

On 6 July 2008, Efraim Zuroff, the Wiesenthal Center's chief Nazi-hunter, went to South America as part of a public campaign to capture the most wanted Nazi in the world and bring him to justice,[21] claiming that Heim was alive and hiding in Patagonia, either in Chile or in Argentina. He elaborated on 15 July 2008 that he was sure Heim was alive and the groundwork had been laid to capture him within weeks.[14][30][31][32][33][34]

In 2008, Heim was named as one of the ten most wanted Nazi war criminals by the Simon Wiesenthal Center.[15][35]

Heim and his former wife, Friedl, had two sons. He also had a daughter, Waltraud, born out of wedlock in Chile.[36]

In 2006, a German newspaper reported that he had a daughter, Waltraud, living on the outskirts of Puerto Montt, Chile, who said he had died in 1993.[37] However, when she tried to recover a multimillion-euro inheritance from an account in his name, she was unable to provide a death certificate.[38][39][40]

In August 2008, Heim's son Rüdiger asked that his father be declared legally dead, in order to take hold of his assets. He claimed he intended to make a donation to humanitarian projects working to document the atrocities committed in the camps.[41]

After years of apparently false sightings, the circumstances surrounding Heim's escape, life in hiding and death were jointly reported by the German broadcaster ZDF and The New York Times in February 2009. It was reported that Heim died on August 10, 1992 in Cairo, Egypt with his cause of death being colorectal cancer.[42][43] In the later years of his life, Heim had named himself Tarek Farid Hussein.[42] People in Egypt who knew Heim said they did not know he was a wanted man.[44]

In an interview at the family's villa in Baden-Baden, his son Rüdiger admitted publicly for the first time that he was with his father in Egypt at the time of Heim's death, saying that it was during the Olympics, and that he died the day after the games ended. According to Efraim Zuroff, Rüdiger Heim had constantly denied having any knowledge of the whereabouts of his father until the publishing of the ZDF research results.[21]

On 18 March 2009, the Simon Wiesenthal Center filed a criminal complaint due to suspicion of false testimony.[45] In 2012, a regional court in Baden-Baden confirmed that Heim died under the assumed identity of Tarek Hussein Farid in Egypt in 1992, based on papers from his lawyer and testimony from his son.[1]

In its 2013 annual Nazi war criminal report, the Simon Wiesenthal Center disputed the 2012 ruling by the Baden-Baden court, claiming a lack of forensic confirmation of Heim's death.[46] Ruediger Heim recounted how Egyptian authorities had forced him to have his father interred in an unmarked common grave in Cairo, rendering it impossible for investigators to find Heim's remains for DNA testing.[47] Heim was not included in the 2014 report.[48]

Israeli author Danny Baz published The Secret Executioners in 2007, in which he claimed that a clandestine organisation called 'The Owl', operating outside of international law, tracked Heim down and assassinated him in the U.S. on an island off the California coast in 1982.[49][50] Baz claimed he was a member of 'The Owl' himself and claimed that his group carried out several assassinations of Nazis who had sought refuge in the USA. The Simon Wiesenthal Centre has expressed doubts regarding Baz's claims.[51]

In her novel The Scent of Lemon Leaves (Lo que esconde tu nombre, 2010) Clara Sánchez gives a fictional account of Heim's refuge in Spain.[52] In the afterword to the novel the author states that she used a real name for a fictional character.

In the fictional Netflix series Jaguar (Global release September 22, 2021) a group of Nazi hunters attempt to catch Heim in Spain in 1962.[53][54][55]

• N.Y. Times (2009) From the Briefcase of Dr. Aribert Heim: The Personal Archives of the Most Wanted Nazi War Criminal, The New York Times, retrieved 4 February 2009 (dozens of Aribert Heim's personal documents have been scanned and are available for viewing on the N.Y. Times' multimedia website)
• Nicholas Kulish; Souad Mekhennet (2014). The Eternal Nazi. New York: Penguin Random House. ISBN 978-0-3855-3243-3.