“The decree does not indicate as to who may fill the position of judge in Standgerichte, whether the judges should be professional people or laymen, and whether the sentences are to be pronounced by a jury or by the judge alone. The decree merely states Standgerichte may be set up by the Reich Protector; he is competent to choose people who are to perform the duties of a judge.”
I omit the rest and continue the quotation on Page 163 of the book of documents, the last paragraph:
“On the basis of the information that we have at hand at present the judges at the Standgerichte were professional judges only in exceptional cases.
“The most important attribute was political reliability. This is the reason why the judges were, one could almost say without exception, members and executives of the NSDAP or other National Socialist organizations; that is, people who with rare exceptions, possessed not the slightest knowledge of law and had no experience in criminal trials.”
I omit the following excerpts and continue the quotation on Page 166 of the document book, at the beginning of the last paragraph; from there I go on to Page 167:
“Standgerichte were never held publicly. Inasmuch as the public was excluded from the preliminary investigations of the Standgerichte, the very existence of this tribunal increased the feeling of insecurity under the prevalent law. There was no appeal against sentences passed by Standgerichte. The records of the investigations of the Standgerichte contain only lists of names of the judges, defendants, and witnesses as well as descriptions of the crimes and the dates of the sentences (Section 4, Paragraph 2, of the decree). Directives permitting and even encouraging such meager records can have only one aim—to prevent any control and to keep secret everything that took place during the investigation, thus covering up all the traces of what had been done.
“According to Section 4, Paragraph 1, of the directive, the Standgerichte could only pass death sentences or turn over the defendants to the Gestapo.”
I omit the following paragraphs containing certain general comments on the same matter and continue my quotation on Page 168, the first paragraph:
“Sentences passed by the Standgerichte must be carried out immediately. (Section 4, Paragraph 3, of the decree). Numerous examples demonstrate that this brutal National Socialist legislation was never toned down. At the end of the so-called trial, it was left to the judges to decide whether the condemned should be shot or hanged. (Section 4, Paragraph 3, of the decree). The condemned person was not granted even a short respite to prepare for death. There was not even a question in the decree about a reprieve. In any case, the brutal haste with which the sentence was carried out, made any reprieve impossible.”
I conclude this excerpt, as well as the entire section devoted to the terrorist legislation of the Hitlerites in Czechoslovakia, with a quotation from Page 169, the fourth line from the top, and further. It is stated there: