In this connection, I wish to quote, by way of example, two cases of preliminary proceedings which have recently come to my hands, and which concern particularly serious aspects.

In the proceedings of 3 J 304/41 vs. Hellig, the defendant, an ethnic German, formerly resident in Northern Bukovina, and formerly of Rumanian nationality, who since became a German national, repeatedly guided, for high reward, ethnic Germans of Rumanian nationality, who had been surprised by the Russian occupation of Northern Bukovina by the Soviet Russians in 1940, allegedly in order to enable them to illegally pass the frontier into Rumania, but then played them into the hands of the Russian frontier guards.

In the proceeding 11 J 8/42 g vs. Golek, the defendant, a former Polish national, of the Polish ethnic group, in the years of 1938 and 1939 in Poland handed over to the Polish authorities his friend, the ethnic German Leo Hardt, of Polish nationality, by accusing him wrongly of treason in favor of the Reich and by concealing in the latter’s house a Polish army regulation book for the purpose of incriminating him. As a result of this action of Golek, Hardt was condemned to 6 years of imprisonment for espionage in favor of Germany.

In the majority of the cases, as in the two cases cited, it will be offenses, which have been committed by foreign nationals abroad against ethnic Germans. To that effect I shall have to report in each individual case especially for the purpose of reaching the decision on initiating prosecution according to article 153a, paragraph 2, Code of Criminal Procedure, so that the doubtful problems mentioned above will have to be decided upon there in each case. There are cases possible, however, in which the offender acted also or only within Germany proper so that a report is practically unnecessary. In view of this and on account of the fundamental importance of this problem, I believed, I should submit it in general already at this time with the request for a decision, as to whether my interpretation is approved.

[Signed] Lautz

THE LOPATA CASE, APRIL-DECEMBER 1942. EXTRACTS FROM THE OFFICIAL FILES INCLUDING: VERDICT OF LOCAL COURT SENTENCING LOPATA, A POLE, TO 2 YEARS’ IMPRISONMENT; DECISION OF THE REICH SUPREME COURT GRANTING NULLITY PLEA FILED BY CHIEF REICH PROSECUTOR; VERDICT OF THE NUERNBERG SPECIAL COURT (DEFENDANT ROTHAUG PRESIDING) SENTENCING LOPATA TO DEATH; THIERACK’S REFUSAL TO PARDON; LOPATA’S LAST PETITION FOR CLEMENCY; AND THE RECORD OF EXECUTION OF THE DEATH SENTENCE

Ds.14/1942

In the Name of the German People

VERDICT