This directive is signed “Thierack.”
The exhibit contains further a directive to the public prosecutors, Linz, and is in part as follows:
“To the: Public Prosecutors, Linz. The authorities in charge of the independent administrative offices. Judges in charge of the juvenile prisons in Ottenheim [and Mattighofen].
“For their knowledge and consideration. The circulars given in the Reich ordinance of the Reich Ministers of Justice, dated 12 February, have been communicated as follows: * * *.”
This directive also contains a form to be used in connection with the discharge of prisoners, designated: “Supplement to: Reich Ordinance of Reich Ministers of Justice, dated 12 February 1945,” with the file mark “IV a 56/45 g,” and has the seal of Linz showing receipt.
The exhibit also includes a directive of “Evacuation of the Judicial Executive Institutions Within the General Plan for the Evacuation of Threatened Territories in the Reich.” This is marked “Secret” and has no heading, no date, and no signature (NG-030, Pros. Ex. 290).
This states, in paragraph 1:
“The evacuation of penal institutions lying within territories threatened by enemy attack is a matter of concern for the public prosecutors of the territories to be evacuated as well as for those within the territories appointed for reception in transit. This does not apply if the evacuation can be confined to a change of locality within the Landesgericht itself. The carrying out without friction of all measures of evacuation therefore depends upon the close cooperation of the public prosecutors concerned who must get in touch with each other on all the particulars which are necessary for those measures. The individual measures for evacuation must be left as far as possible to the personal initiative of the public prosecutors concerned, as only they possess the necessary knowledge of local conditions and are able to bring about the required cooperation with local administrative and Party offices. These directives can only give an indication of what is to be done.”
From the import, a fair inference is that it was an enclosure to the original letter of Thierack.
Further along, the document states: