2. Statement of facts—Details are not known here since the judicial authorities had nothing to do with the matter. Whether the military judicial authorities have knowledge of it (case Dickmann) is not known here either.
3. Legal basis for the executions without trial—The Fuehrer is said to have ordered these executions, or to have approved them. Furthermore, he is said to have ordered that the Reich Leader SS should maintain by all means the security within the territory of the Reich, and this order includes also immediate execution in cases of actions in violation of war laws (report of SS Brigadefuehrer Dr. Best).
Upon the request for information about this order of the Fuehrer, Gruppenfuehrer Heydrich replied that the Minister of Justice should contact the Fuehrer directly in regard to the executions.
4. Legal situation—Should the information made available to the Ministry of Justice be correct, then a concurrent jurisdiction would now exist in the nonoccupied territory of the Reich, that is outside of the area of combat and operation. There would exist in this area a concurrent jurisdiction for the punishment of war crimes between the People’s Court, the military courts, and the Special Court on one hand, and the police on the other hand. According to which criteria should the question of the competency be decided in the individual case?
Within the nonoccupied territory the state of public order and security does not permit that any authority should be hampered or disturbed in its activities.
The criminal procedure according to the war laws is practically the same as the procedure before the courts martial. The Special Courts have just not been called courts martial. I refer to the case of the farmer Glein from Obersleben near Weimar, who during the night of 18 September 1939 put fire to his grain-rick and thus destroyed 100 hundred-weights of grain. He was sentenced to death by the Special Court on 18 September 1939.
5. In a further case (Ernst Georgi of Freiberg), a warrant of arrest had been issued against the defendant on charges of fraud. The State Police, Office Plauen, suggested to place Georgi at the disposal of the Secret State Police, and to cancel the trial fixed for the 18th of this month, since this file should be treated in a special way according to an order of the chief of the Security Police and, therefore, a transfer to the trial in Freiberg would not be feasible.
In this case the crime was committed before the war decree [Kriegsverordnung] took effect. After a short period the defendant was returned to the public prosecutor. The trial took place, and the sentence (10 years penitentiary, and protective custody) was passed on 26 September 1939. The Security Police did not refer to a general order in this case. What the legal basis was for the interference with the court proceedings, is not known to me.
6. I think it to be urgent that the problem, whether crimes committed in the nonoccupied territories should be punished according to the war laws, or by the police without criminal proceedings and without a sentence, be clarified in general.
Berlin, 28 September 1939