. NMT03-T0315
Volume III · Page 315
3. Ill-treatment of internees arising out of sheer fun, or for sadistic motives.
I should like to make the following detailed comments on those three categories:
About No. 1. In the remand prisons and penal establishments under the Ministry of Justice, there was no need to introduce corporal punishment as a disciplinary measure. The experience of the administration of justice has taught that a well trained, reliable, and conscientious personnel of wardens is in a position to set up and to maintain model order under a strict discipline, even without corporal punishment. The more training and discipline the prison guards have, the less need exists to introduce corporal punishment as a disciplinary measure.
But if, contrary to this view, one is to suppose that there might he a need to introduce corporal punishment in concentration camps, it appears indispensable that this disciplinary measure and the manner of its application should be determined, uniformly and unambiguously, for the whole territory of the Reich. It has happened recently that camp orders of individual concentration camps concerning this matter and the use of weapons, contained unusually severe instructions which were brought to the knowledge of the internees as a stern warning, while the warden per was administratively informed that these regulations which dated mostly from 1933 were no longer applicable. Such a situation is equally dangerous for the warden personnel and for 'he internees. It would therefore appear, after the question of imposing protective custody was generally settled by the competent minister, that in the interests of all concerned, one should urgently and clearly define responsibility and legal aspect, further that the same responsible authority would have to settle, by means of camp regulations generally applicable, the question of corporal punishment as a disciplinary measure, which is still unclarified, as well as the question of the use of arms by the warden personnel.
About No. 2. 1 cannot concur with the opinions expressed in the enclosed letter. The present penal law, which I have to enforce, renders liable to particularly severe penalties those officials guilty of inflicting ill-treatment in the performance of their duties, especially when such ill-treatment is used to extort admissions or statements. That these legal provisions also reflect the will of the Fuehrer and Reich Chancellor is shown by the fact that, during the suppression of the Roehm revolt, the Fuehrer ordered the shooting of three members of the SS who had ill-treated prisoners in Stettin. That being the legal situation, it is out of order to grant
