Being a politician means power. And power means, on occasion, being able to commit terrible crimes and get away with it. Politicians who killed people range from dictators to diplomats who literally got away with murder thanks to diplomatic immunity. Sometimes they pulled the trigger, other times they got someone else to do it. But they all came out the other end with minor repercussions - if any at all.
The 2016 revelation that Vladimir Putin likely ordered the poisoning of a dissident former KGB spy is just one of many allegations against powerful dictators. Joseph Stalin personally masterminded a robbery in which 40 people were killed, while Adolf Hitler purged his own ranks and ordered the executions of bitter rivals. Then there are the drunken escapades of powerful leaders in cars, and the brutal Chechen leader accused of beheading enemy soldiers.
Here are some politicians from the last 100 years who either murdered people or personally ordered deaths, and suffered little or no consequences.
http://www.ranker.com/list/politicians-who-killed-people/mike-rothschild, death, history, politics & history, politicians, people, crime, politics,
Adolf Hitler
While Hitler was responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of people before and during World War II, he had a much more hands on role in a series of murders carried out in 1934. During the purge of the Nazi Party, called the Night of the Long Knives, Hitler personally ordered the execution of dozens of left-wingers, anti-Nazis, and members of his own paramilitary organization, the SA, who Hitler felt were a threat to his power.
Hitler even took part in the purge, though he likely didn't pull the trigger. He had the SA get together at an isolated resort, then gathered a large band of SS men to ambush them in their sleep. Hitler himself arrested SA leader Ernst Rohm, held him at gunpoint, and turned him over to police. He also ordered the on-the-spot shooting of an SA leader and a teenage boy who were in bed together when they were arrested. After considering Rohm's fate for a few days, Hitler personally ordered him shot.
Bill Janklow
Janklow was South Dakota's longest serving governor, holding the position for 16 years. He was then elected to the state's only House seat, but his political career ended when he ran a stop sign while speeding, hitting and killing a motorcyclist. He claimed he'd blacked out due to low blood sugar.
The 2003 accident revealed that Janklow was a serial speeder, who often boasted about his lead foot, and had over a dozen tickets and nearly two dozen other traffic stops that went without tickets due to fear of political retribution. He was tried and found guilty, but only of manslaughter. He served 100 days in jail, and went back to his law practice.
Che Guevara
While he's become a symbol of left-wing student revolution, it should be remembered that Che Guevara, besides being Fidel Castro's second-in-command, was a hardened executioner. He is known to have ordered firing squads for countless opponents, and personally shot an unknown number of people.
His most well-known shooting was of Eutimo Guerra, a peasant farmer working as a guide for Castro's forces during the Cuban Revolution. When Guerra's treason came to light, he asked for a quick death, and Che shot him in the head. Guevara became an informal ambassador for Cuba, then began traveling to spread the gospel of revolution. He was later executed by Bolivian troops, likely working on behalf of the CIA.
Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada
A two-time president of Bolivia, Sánchez de Lozada's second term took a turn for the murderous when he authorized the selling of Bolivian gas to Chile - a hated foe of Bolivia. Massive protests followed, and Sánchez de Lozada deployed the military to stop them, by any means necessary. That they did, opening fire on the crowd, and killing 67 men, women and children.
Sánchez de Lozada resigned, was charged with genocide, and fled to the US. As Bolivia and the US have no extradition treaty, the dictator has been able to carve out a nice life in a Maryland suburb, while Bolivia's case against him winds its way through US courts.
Joseph Stalin
Stalin's murderous reign over the Soviet Union left millions of his own people dead, often executed via lists that Uncle Joe himself personally approved. But in the early days of Russia’s Bolshevik Revolution, bandits like Stalin paid for their activities through an old-fashioned form of fundraising: bank robbery.
Stalin personally planned what became the 1907 Tiflis stagecoach robbery, when a group of Bolsheviks attacked a stagecoach carrying over 300,000 rubles (now valued at over $3 million) to the Tiflis branch of the State Bank of the Russian Empire. A gunfight broke out and 40 robbers, guards, and civilians were either shot dead or blown up by bombs. Stalin's involvement in the heist itself is disputed, as different stories have him doing everything from personally fighting police to calmly standing off to the side smoking his pipe.
The bandits got away, though the notes they stole were already marked, and thus worthless. Only one man was ever tried for the crime; he was latter killed in an accident that Stalin might have orchestrated.
Ramzan Kadyrov
Taking the office of President of Chechnya at just 30 years old, Kadyrov has been accused of either personally committing or abetting a staggering range of crimes - including murder. He likely ordered the killing of a Russian reporter in 2006, controls a personal militia accused of a wide swatch of crimes, had a former bodyguard killed for going to the New York Times, and ordered the kidnapping and murder of a woman who had been investigating his militias. He's also been accused of beheading Russian prisoners of war at some point in the '90s.
Ted Kennedy
In 1969, Senator Ted Kennedy drove his car off a bridge on remote Chappaquiddick Island, in Massachusetts. His passenger, Mary Jo Kopechne, drowned while Kennedy swam to safety. He then went back to his hotel room and slept - waiting nine hours to report the incident. Meanwhile, Kopechne's body was found that morning, having died of drowning or suffocation. Kennedy pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of an accident and was given a two month suspended jail sentence.
The incident hung around Kennedy's neck for the rest of his life, likely preventing him from becoming president.
Vladimir Putin
While the Russian premier has long been suspected of having political opponents and dissidents killed, a British inquiry released in January 2016 all but confirmed it. The lengthy report pinned the blame for the 2006 death of former KGB officer turned Putin critic Alexander Litvinenko on Putin, saying he almost certainly ordered the man to be poisoned with polonium, a rare radioactive isotope found in Russian nuclear reactors.
Litvinenko was likely poisoned in November 2006, when he met two Russian defectors for tea in London.
Joshua Walde
Walde was a minor diplomat in the US embassy in Nairobi, Kenya in 2013, when he was involved in a fatal car accident. Recklessly driving over the speed limit in an SUV, he hit a mini-bus head on, killing a father of four and injuring eight others. Walde invoked diplomatic immunity and was taken back to the US. His status ensures he'll face no charges, leaving the victims of the crash without recourse - and financially destitute.
Sao Boonwaat
Sao Boonwaat committed what's likely the most famous abuse of diplomatic immunity in history. In 1967, Boonwaat was Burma's ambassador to Sri Lanka. He found out his wife was having an affair, so he shot her dead. Then he methodically built a funeral pyre on his front lawn, put the body on it, and set it on fire.
Because the embassy was technically on Burmese soil (as all embassies are considered home soil of the country to which they belong), Boonwaat was able to invoke diplomatic immunity and was quickly released after he was arrested. He returned to Burma and never faced justice for the murder.