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Volume V · Page 1211
| Defense counsel says: |
"The finding in the judgment that an increase in the compensation for prisoners would have benefited the SS is incorrect; it does not tally with the result of the evidence presented. The exact opposite is true. The compensation for prisoners, which had to be paid by the W enterprises, was a payment to the Reich, i.e., an expense and not a gain for the W enterprises. The compensation was paid exclusively to the Reich into a special account. The fact that 5-6 million RM were booked in this account, can therefore not be regarded as an incrimination of Baier, but can only serve to exonerate him." |
| It is not clear that this exonerated Baier. The W enterprises paid to the Reich, of which they were certainly a part, 5,000,000 – 6,000,000 Reichsmarks for the use of slave labor. The Reich had no legal rights to payment for these prisoners, it had no legal rights in the prisoners whatsoever. If A kidnaps B and then hires him out to C who knows of the kidnaping, C is certainly not free from crime because he had nothing to do with the kidnaping or did not actually receive any money from the kidnaper or the victim. It is certain, in such a case, that C would have benefited from the use of the victim, as the W enterprises certainly benefited from the use of this "cheap" labor. With reference to the Judgment wherein the Tribunal imputes knowledge to Baier of the excessive work hours imposed on the inmates, defense counsel says: |
"Just in passing, I wish to mention here — because it is characteristic of the situation as it was at that time — that SS members, civilian employees, and civilian workers in the WVHA worked 12 hours per day." |
| But there is an abysmal difference between
working on one hand for pay and, let us suppose, for one's country too, and on
the other hand slaving gratuitously and being beaten, starved, and in many
instances being required to manufacture arms and equipment to be used against
one's own countrymen! The Tribunal did not convict Baier of complicity in the OSTI operation, but it did say that "his office trafficked in the ill-gotten gains from OSTI." Defense counsel says in his brief: |
"It is merely established that Pohl as chairman of the supervisory board, for want of another office, gave the order to the staff W to supervise in a legal capacity the liquidation of the OSTI in order to see to it that the business was properly wound up." |
| Staff W cannot plead innocence and certainly not ignorance of the evil doings of OSTI, and while this is not a major element of proof against Baier, it all argues against his oft repeated |
