Title:Podcast tracks French railway’s complicity in Holocaust

In 1942, Leo Bretholz leaped from a French state-owned train transporting him toward Auschwitz, a daring escape that allowed him to survive the Holocaust and eventually settle in the United States. But tens of thousands of others were taken toward their deaths on those trains, leading Raphael Prober (SFS’00, L’03), in partnership with Matthew Slutsky and Tablet Studios, to develop the podcast “Covering Their Tracks,” documenting a multi-generational pursuit of justice for Holocaust survivors deported from France toward the death camps.

The five-part podcast follows the decade Prober and his colleagues at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld spent working pro bono on a legal case against the Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer Français (SNCF), France’s national state-owned railway company that transported Jews toward concentration camps during the Holocaust.

“A lot of my family perished in the Holocaust so this has always been very personal, but once I met the survivors we were representing, I became even more committed,” says Prober.

SNCF “never paid reparations or fully addressed their complicity,” Prober explains.

Of the 76,000 people deported toward Auschwitz on SNCF trains, approximately 2,000 survived the death camps. Although France had reparations programs for French citizens, those programs did not extend to non-citizens.

“There was a massive gap in accountability, not just because of the reparations—although that’s an important demonstration of remorse—but because SNCF refused to accept responsibility for decades,” he says.

Additionally, because the French government owned SNCF, the survivors encountered foreign sovereign immunity issues requiring the introduction of federal legislation that would make France susceptible to suit in U.S. courts for their role in the Holocaust.

“I knew I needed to do whatever I could to help to hold SNCF accountable,” Prober says.

From litigation and legislation, this case ultimately was resolved with a $60 million settlement paid by France to the survivors and their families.

“This story demonstrates how much the truth matters, how much an honest recitation of history matters, how much the facts matter, and how much ultimate accountability matters,” he says.

“Covering Their Tracks” garnered critical acclaim, winning Rio Web Festival’s best nonfiction podcast of 2024, the 2025 New Media Film Festival award for best podcast, and becoming an honoree for the Webby Awards’ best documentary podcast of 2024.

“You can capture so many important stories within the podcast genre,” he says. “At Georgetown Law School, I quickly came to appreciate the unbelievable power of the law and storytelling, and this podcast is an outgrowth of that power.”