. NMT05-T0923
Volume V · Page 923
| himself guilty of the objective
characteristic of the offense any other way than by membership. Thus, the great
number guilty members of the SS who are in such manner still to be found out is
declared to be a criminal group of persons. The defendant Scheide had no direct knowledge of the purposes of the SS, as far as the above-mentioned objective characteristic of the offense is concerned. It must be examined, however, whether he had to know such a purpose according to the above-mentioned extension of the definition of knowledge. We have heard a great number of witnesses here with regard to the question of presumption of knowledge of crimes accord to count two and three of the indictment. I have never made a secret of it that I think this question of presumption of knowledge, in particular about crimes in the concentration camps — as this is nearest — to be the decisive point the trial for the defendant Scheide, represented by me, with regard to count four of the indictment. I therefore have interrogated each of the witnesses on this question. Among the witnesses interrogated there were witnesses for the prosecution and witnesses for the defense, and some of the defendants themselves have to a certain extent stated their point of view on the question of presumption of knowledge. The following turned out to be the essential result: Among the witnesses who gave their point of view as inmates of a concentration camp as far as the question of presumption of knowledge is concerned, there is first of all the witness Kogon. Kogon was an inmate of the concentration camp Buchenwald from 1937 to 1945; he is the author of the book, "Der SS Staat," [The SS State]. Answering my question whether an administrative officer of the SS within a concentration camp, for instance, had to know exactly about individual crimes, the witness stated as follows: |
"An administrative officer who was employed in the camp or outside the camp in the administration office, well, that depended upon the circumstances, upon his own will. This was just like with the inmates themselves. You should be in a camp as an inmate for years and years and not bother about anything as as you were not directly concerned yourself, and if then you were among the survivors, of course you knew only fragments and small details, more or less nothing at all, compared with the whole." |
| Well, Kogon speaks about an administrative officer who was employed in the camp or outside the camp in the administration. At any rate, this is somebody who was in direct contact with the con- […centration] |
