Alfred Spit

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Alfred W. Spieß (born October 12, 1919 in Hilden ; † June 27, 2001 ibid) was a German lawyer and senior public prosecutor at the Düsseldorf regional court . He has made particular contributions in the search for justice for the victims of the Holocaust . Among other things, he was head of the central office in North Rhine-Westphalia for the prosecution of Nazi crimes and prosecutor in the Treblinka trials .

life and career

From the beginning of the 1950s, Spieß made a career from court assessor to chief public prosecutor. In 1974 the state government made him head of the Wuppertal public prosecutor's office . He later became head of the Düsseldorf Public Prosecutor's Office.

Major court cases

It is thanks to his research in his function as chief public prosecutor in Düsseldorf that the history, planning and course of the Tannenberg company , the provocations of border incidents at the end of August 1939 as the reason for the campaign against Poland, can be precisely reconstructed. After years of investigation, he discovered and questioned the surviving witnesses. He arranged for the files to be released and, in 1979, for legal proceedings to begin.

At the Treblinka trial in 1970, Spieß obtained a life sentence as a prosecutor against SS-Hauptsturmführer Franz Stangl , the only one against a commanding officer of an extermination camp.

Spieß also brought charges against the former State Secretary in the Reich Ministry of Transport , Albert Ganzenmüller , for aiding and abetting a millionfold murder. The process illustrates for the first time the importance of the Reichsbahn in the Holocaust.

Journalistic activity

Spieß also dealt with the history and politics of Europe as well as with new contemporary historical literature. He wrote important articles for trade magazines and wrote the book Tannenberg - How Hitler Deceived the World , which he created together with the WDR editor Heiner Lichtenstein , Cologne, and whose content was made known in radio and television broadcasts across Europe.

estate

Spieß left extensive material on Nazi crimes for lawyers and historians. The estate of Alfred W. Spieß consists mainly of documents collected by him on the trials in various cities and countries against former National Socialists who were involved in mass extermination in the Treblinka, Majdanek and others camps and in which he led the prosecution . They are copies of court testimony and questioning of defendants, of court orders and their repeal and resumption.

Honors

In 1991, Alfred Spieß received the Federal Cross of Merit on ribbon for his services to the historical and legal coming to terms with the Nazi past , which was presented to him by the then Minister of Justice of North Rhine-Westphalia, Rolf Krumsiek .

Fonts

  • Together with Heiner Lichtenstein : Tannenberg company. The occasion for World War II . Corrected and expanded edition. Ullstein, Frankfurt am Main et al. 1989, ISBN 3-548-33118-1 (with a foreword by Robert MW Kempner).
  • National Socialist violent crimes from the point of view of perpetrators, witnesses and the unaffected environment . In: Encounters No. 3/73, pp. 34–65.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Spit, Alfred
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Spieß, Alfred W.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German lawyer and senior public prosecutor
DATE OF BIRTH October 12, 1919
PLACE OF BIRTH Hilden
DATE OF DEATH June 27, 2001
Place of death Hilden