HAMBURG, Germany (AP) — A 93-year-old former SS private is going on trial in Germany on 5,230 counts of being an accessory to murder, accused of helping the Nazis' Stutthof concentration camp function.

Though he is not accused of any specific killing, Bruno Dey is charged as an accessory to those committed at Stutthof from August 1944 to April 1945 when he served as a guard there, because he helped prevent prisoners from escaping, according to the charges filed by Hamburg prosecutors.

Dey himself argues he wasn't a follower of Nazi ideology and that he was only sent there as a guard because a health issue prevented him from serving at the front. He says the killings would have taken place with or without him.