. NMT03-T0129
Volume III · Page 129
decree of 29 January 1943. The practice of seditious undermining of the military power, to which the indictment refers, therefore did not take place until Schlegelberger's retirement. At the time of Schlegelberger's tenure of office these cases of defeatism were judged according to the Insidious Statement Law [Heimtueckegesetz] and were not punishable by death but by a maximum penalty of 5 years' imprisonment. The extension of the German criminal jurisdiction to include crimes committed abroad as well was practiced before Schlegelberger took over the administration.
I shall deal in detail with the legal question of the extension of German law to the occupied territories and I shall throw some light on the origin and the application of the ordinance concerning crimes of Poles and Jews. I shall show by means of the documents already submitted by the prosecution what demands were trade by the Party concerning the treatment of the Poles and Jews and how these requests were opposed by law and in practice. Schlegelberger's general attitude toward the Jewish question will be the subject of the discussion.
Even if the prosecution connects the defendant Schlegelberger with the extradition to the police of so-called asocial persons as well as of Poles and of Jews, the defense will prove that those orders were only given according to an agreement made between Himmler and Thierack in September 1942. Previous, special cases only concerned direct orders by Hitler given to the police and which could not be prevented by the administration of justice. We shall see that the police had started during the time of Guertner to remove prisoners from the prison by command of Hitler if Hitler considered the sentence passed during the criminal proceedings, a too mild one. Only in order to prevent this if possible or at least to restrict it did Guertner insist that he be informed of this order at the same time as were the police. It was only because of that request that the administration of justice dealt with these matters at all. It will be proved that everything possible was done In order to prevent extraditions to the police.
I shall also speak of the practice of granting pardons and find here also a confirmation of Schlegelberger's general attitude.
The indictment also deals with the so-called euthanasia. We shall see that Schlegelberger opposed the carrying out of the euthanasia program soon after taking over the administration. He obviously succeeded, for we shall establish that the measures were stopped in August 1941 and were only started again at the time of Thierack as can be seen from the meeting described by the witness Suchomel.
Concerning sterilization, we shall offer abundant evidence to prove that the practice of the courts, for protecting the hereditary
