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Concept
Fred A. Leuchter
Summary
Fred Arthur Leuchter Jr. (born February 7, 1943) is an American manufacturer of execution equipment and Holocaust denier, best known as the author of the Leuchter report, a pseudoscientific document alleging there were no gas chambers at Auschwitz-Birkenau. Prior to the document's publication, he was contracted by authorities of several U.S. states to improve the designs of instruments for capital punishment. He was charged in Massachusetts with misrepresenting himself to penitentiaries as an engineer, despite having no relevant qualifications. He plea bargained with state prosecutors and received two years' probation. He has also been accused of running a "death row shakedown", where he threatened to testify for the defense in capital cases if he was not given contracts for his services by that state.
Leuchter became internationally known for his testimony in defense of Holocaust denier Ernst Zündel in 1988. His study for Zündel's trial has been referred to as the Leuchter report since it was published by Zündel with that title.
Leuchter's work is often presented by Holocaust deniers as scientifically based evidence for Holocaust denial, even though his research methods and findings having been widely discredited on both scientific and historical grounds. Leuchter and his report are the subject of Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr., a 1999 feature-length documentary film by Errol Morris.
Leuchter was born on February 7, 1943, to Fred Arthur Leuchter Sr. in Malden, Massachusetts.
He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in history from Boston University in 1964. He holds patents for a geodetic instrument and an electronic sextant.
Leuchter started Fred Leuchter Associates in 1979, with which he sold services to several states to help them maintain, improve, document, and ascertain the effectiveness of their equipment for administration of capital punishment. His initial work was with electric chairs, starting in Tennessee. His broader claims are that his work in this area is humanitarian, providing greater respect for both guards and those to be executed.
Official source
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