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any crimes, we are, in this case near the conclusion of the Nuernberg
Trials as such, faced with the first and unique instance of an employee of a
private firm in a subordinate position being held responsible to the same
extent as the members of the management for such alleged conditions and
incidents in the firm. I am firmly convinced that the Tribunal will take this
extraordinary fact into account.
In as far as Dr. Lehmann was mentioned
in connection with the counts of the indictment, namely number one (planning,
preparation, initiation, and waging of wars of aggression) and number four
(participation in a common plan and conspiracy), I think I do not have to waste
any words on the defense, as the prosecution has not even produced the
slightest trace of evidence that defendant Dr. Lehmann had anything to do with
these matters. He entered employment at the firm of Krupp in 1940, later than
all other defendants. I am confident that the Tribunal will not hold
responsible an employee in a nonexecutive position, of an administrative
department of a branch of a private industrial enterprise for alleged crimes of
which, in the trial against the main war criminals before the IMT, 14 out of 22
defendants were acquitted, all of them being highest officials of the State,
the Wehrmacht, Party, and industry, including Funk, Schacht, Doenitz, Bormann,
von Papen, Speer, and Sauckel.
If at this juncture I do not formally
move on behalf of defendant Lehmann that proceedings be discontinued at least
under counts one and four, it is only because a motion of such a nature has
already been submitted by the entire defense on behalf of all defendants.
I believe, therefore, that in stating the defense of defendant Lehmann
I may restrict myself to refuting the prosecution statement that Dr. Lehmann
had any decisive influence in the procurement, treatment, and assignment of
prisoners of war, foreign workers, and concentration camp prisoners in the
plant of the Gusstahlfabrik at Essen. For the rest, I shall deal briefly with
Dr. Lehmann’s career and his position in the firm of Krupp. With the help
of a minimum of evidence, I shall establish his blameless character and
convince the Tribunal that no guilt is attached to this defendant. |
| |
| M. Opening Statement for the Defendant
Kupke* |
| |
| DR. BEHRINGER: Your Honors. In its indictment the prosecution
charges my client, Mr. Hans Kupke, with having committed |
__________
* Opening statement is
recorded in mimeographed transcript, 22 March 1948, pp. 4842-4848.
221 |
. 
