Friedrich Karl Kaul

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Friedrich Karl Kaul (1956)
Kaul (left) with the accused editor Albert Grohmann in front of the Tiergarten District Court (1960)

Friedrich Karl Kaul (born February 21, 1906 in Poznan ; † April 16, 1981 in East Berlin ) was a lawyer, university professor and writer in the GDR .

Stations

Friedrich Karl Kaul was born as the son of the well-to-do textile entrepreneur Albrecht Kaul and his wife Emmi, who came from a wealthy Jewish family. The family lived in Poznan. When Posen became Polish after the end of the First World War , the family moved to Berlin, where Kaul attended the Grunewald High School until he graduated from high school. In Kaul's own words, his upbringing was Prussian and loyal to the Kaiser, and his schooling was humanistic. From 1925 Kaul studied law in Heidelberg , where he became a member of a striking student association , and from 1926 in Berlin . In 1929 he passed the first state examination in law in Berlin. "Believing in the state and apolitical", Kaul accepted an assistant position offered by James Goldschmidt , a law professor at the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Berlin . In 1931 Kaul defended his dissertation on the subject of the development of custodial sentences into central punishment in the Prussian criminal system , which was published in 1932. In the meantime he had started his legal clerkship and was aiming for the second state examination. During his legal clerkship, Kaul became acquainted with left-liberal and left-wing views. In 1929 he made the acquaintance of the attorney Paul Levi, who specializes in political proceedings, during a political trial by the senior Reich attorney Paul Jorns against the editor of the left-liberal daily book Josef Bornstein . He also worked for the Red Aid . Levi became a role model for the young career starter.

After the Nazi seizure of power , Kaul was dismissed from his clerkship in February 1933 for “racial reasons” so that he could not take the oral examination of the second state examination, which was scheduled for April 1933. This ruined Kaul's professional career. He could neither become a lawyer nor join the judiciary. Kaul joined opposition groups. In 1935 he was arrested by the Gestapo at a meeting of the Red Aid and first brought to Lichtenburg and later to Dachau . Kauls wife Luise managed to get former professors Kauls to help. His “Jewish” doctoral supervisor James Goldschmidt, who was not allowed to give lectures as early as 1933 and had been forced to retire in 1934, succeeded in helping him and contributing to his dismissal. Kaul had to leave the country immediately and then came to Colombia and later to Central America .

In 1941/42 Kaul was interned in Nicaragua as an enemy alien and extradited to the USA . There he was sent to an anti-Nazi camp .

Urn grave of Friedrich Karl Kaul in the central cemetery Friedrichsfelde in Berlin

After the end of the Second World War , he returned to Germany in 1945 and moved to East Berlin . He joined the KPD , which was forcibly united with the SPD to form the SED in the Soviet occupation zone in 1946 , and worked as a legal advisor for the Berlin radio station . Since Kaul had been admitted to the Kammergericht even before the judicial systems of Berlin were separated , he was also able to appear as a licensed criminal defense attorney in West Berlin and all West German courts . He was subsequently involved in all state security proceedings in the Federal Republic of Germany that were carried out against communists and FDJ members and often appeared as a joint plaintiff in proceedings against perpetrators of Nazi injustice. In the trial against the KPD before the Federal Constitutional Court , he was the KPD's chief attorney. In 1960 he was appointed professor. From the first Auschwitz trial in Frankfurt onwards, he appeared in 17 criminal proceedings against violent Nazi criminals as a representative of the joint plaintiffs for the victims living in the GDR. From 1963 to 1965 he was a joint plaintiff in the Frankfurt Auschwitz Trial, from 1967 to 1970 in the Essen Dora Trial and in 1970 acted as a representative of the joint plaintiffs in the Düsseldorf Treblinka Trial .

From 1970 to 1972 he represented Eberhard Czichon and his publisher Manfred Pahl-Rugenstein against the lawsuit brought by Hermann Josef Abs because of his role on the board of directors of Deutsche Bank during the Nazi era . When Abs made several affidavits to refute Czichon's claims, Kaul charged him with perjury . In vain, Kaul lost the trials, Czichon and Pahl-Rugenstein were sentenced to a compensation payment of DM 20,000. The sum threatened to ruin the publisher, but Kaul negotiated with Abs' lawyer that the enforcement would not be pursued. Instead, the publisher and the SED behind it refrained from launching further journalistic attacks on Abs and the Deutsche Bank and published the OMGUS reports, which contained incriminating material about Abs.

Kaul was also a well-known personality in the Federal Republic of Germany. In two articles in the Spiegel he was referred to as a “star lawyer”. His anti-fascist engagement also included the long struggle for the judicial punishment of the murder of Ernst Thälmann . He also wrote a book about it. From 1971 to 1974 he defended Beate Klarsfeld in criminal proceedings for the attempted kidnapping of the war criminal Kurt Lischka to France. Kaul's appearance as a joint plaintiff in the trials against National Socialist criminals was also used for propaganda purposes by the GDR. The GDR presented itself as a representative of the victims of the Nazi dictatorship .

In 1977 Kaul organized a secret cooperation between the GDR State Security and lawyers for RAF terrorists in the Federal Republic of Germany.

In the GDR, the lawyer was best known for his television program Ask Professor Kaul , in which he discussed and commented on legal issues from everyday life (previously radio program Dr. Kaul replies ; television program later continued by Friedrich Wolff under the title Everything that is right ). Kaul also wrote crime stories , novels, radio and television plays, sometimes under the pseudonym Friedrich Karl Hartmann, including the crime film series Bonner Pitaval for GDR television . In the first episode, The Heyde-Sawade Affair , Kaul filmed the scandal of the Nazi euthanasia officer Werner Heyde, who had gone into hiding in West Germany , documented the case and assessed it legally. Kaul was the first to address the murders of the sick under National Socialism to a broader public in the GDR . Kaul died in Berlin in 1981. He worked as a lawyer until his death. His office was continued by his colleagues Winfried Matthäus and Günter Ullmann, who had previously worked closely with Kaul in the college of lawyers. Both continued their close cooperation with the Stasi of the GDR.

His urn was buried in the Pergolenweg grave complex at the Socialist Memorial at Berlin's Friedrichsfelde Central Cemetery.

Awards

Publications (selection)

  • Funkhaus Masurenallee . A radio play, 82 minutes, 1951.
  • I told the truth: Lilly Wächter - a role model for German women in the struggle for peace , Deutscher Frauen Verlag, Berlin 1952
  • Prosecutors in the dock - experiences and experiences with West Berlin courts . 2 volumes 1952/1953
  • The Pitaval of the Weimar Republic , Volume 1: Justice becomes a crime . Berlin 1953
  • The Pitaval of the Weimar Republic, Volume 2: Earning is a top priority . Berlin 1954.
  • Der Ring (a detective novel), Berlin 1954.
  • The way to nowhere (novel), Das Neue Berlin, Berlin 1955, yellow series
  • I demand acquittal . Dietz Verlag, Berlin 1955.
  • The blue folder / murder in Grunewald - an innocent man is supposed to go to jail . (Two novels; Mord im Grunewald is a novel about the assassination attempt on the then German Foreign Minister Walter Rathenau ; the blue folder was also made into a film) Berlin 1957
  • Fernsehpitaval (teleplay series 1958-78), scenarios of these films were mainly Kaul, along with Walter Jupe , written
  • Little Weimar Pitaval , Berlin 1959.
  • It is time that you get home . The New Berlin, Berlin 1959.
  • The double loop (novel), Das Neue Berlin, Berlin 1961.
  • And that by right . VEB Dt. Zentralverlag, Berlin 1961.
  • The Pitaval of the Weimar Republic, It crackles in the beams, Volume 3 . Berlin 1961.
  • The Eichmann case . Das Neue Berlin, Berlin 1963. - A report on the trial in Jerusalem
  • Noble people - The Bonn Pitaval . Berlin 1964
  • The fall of Herschel Grynszpan . Akademie Verlag, Berlin 1965
  • From the Stadtvogtei to Moabit - A Berlin Pitaval . Berlin 1965
  • A pitaval. Volume 1: Ten criminal cases and trial reports from 1894 to 1925 . Berlin 1966.
  • A pitaval. Volume 2: Ten criminal cases and trial reports from 1926 to 1964. Berlin 1966.
  • I demand acquittal - West Berlin trials from 1949 to 1959. Berlin 1966.
  • Defendant No. 6 - An Auschwitz Documentation. Berlin 1966.
  • Murder in Grunewald - the way to nowhere. Berlin 1966, DNB 457163690 . (Murder of Rathenau)
  • Doctors in Auschwitz. 1968.
  • So help me God - Imperial Pitaval. Berlin 1968.
  • I accuse. Hamburg 1971.
  • Dr. Sawade makes a career: the case of euthanasia doctor Dr. Heyde . Frankfurt am Main 1971
  • History of the Reichsgericht , Volume IV (1933–1945) . Berlin 1971
  • In robe and tie - Before courts of the FRG - The defense attorney has the floor . Berlin 1972, DNB 730414841
  • Nazi Murder Action T4 - A report on the first industrial murder action of the Nazi regime. Berlin 1973.
  • DINA : the Chilean Gestapo. Berlin 1976
  • Watergate - a sign for the USA. Berlin 1976
  • Legal questions for you and me. Berlin 1979.
  • The psychiatry in the maelstrom of " euthanasia ". Berlin 1979
  • "... is to be executed!" A profile of the German class justice system. Berlin 1981.
New edition: Berlin 2006, ISBN 3-355-01724-8 .
  • People in Court - A Pitaval from our day. Berlin 1981. Several more editions.
  • Processes that made history - German Pitaval from 1887 to 1933. Berlin 1988, ISBN 3-360-00164-8 .

Filmography

Radio plays

literature

  • Annette Rosskopf: Friedrich Karl Kaul: Lawyer in divided Germany (1906-1981) . Berlin 2002, ISBN 3-8305-0130-7 .
  • Annette Rosskopf: On the life and work of the lawyer Friedrich Karl Kaul (1906-1981). In Klaus Bästlein, Annette Rosskopf, Falco Werkentin : Contributions to the legal history of the GDR . Berlin 2000. Here 4th edition, Berlin 2009 (= series of publications by the Berlin State Commissioner for the Documents of the State Security Service of the former GDR, Vol. 12). ISBN 978-3-934085-05-3 , pp. 4-32. Online here. [1]
  • Short biography for:  Kaul, Friedrich Karl . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 1. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .

Web links

Commons : Friedrich Karl Kaul  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Annette Rosskopf: Criminal defense as an ideological offensive. The life of the lawyer Friedrich Karl Kaul (1906–1981) ( Memento of the original from October 11, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / fhi.rg.mpg.de archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . In: forum historiae juris. 1998.
  2. ↑ Rosskopf, Berlin 2000, p. 6.
  3. ^ Annette Rosskopf: On the life and work of the lawyer Friedrich Karl Kaul (1906-1981). In Klaus Bästlein, Annette Rosskopf, Falco Werkentin : Contributions to the legal history of the GDR . Berlin 2000, p. 8.
  4. ↑ See Martin Heger: James Goldschmidt. 1874-1940. In: Stefan Grundmann et al. (Ed.): Festschrift 200 Years of the Law Faculty of the Humboldt University in Berlin. Past, present and future. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2010, ISBN 978-3-89949-629-1 , p. 484.
  5. ↑ Bernd-Rainer Barth , Helmut Müller-Enbergs :  Kaul, Friedrich Karl . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 1. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .
  6. ↑ Sebastian Brünger: History and Profit. How German corporations deal with their Nazi past . Wallstein, Göttingen 2017, pp. 172–194.
  7. ↑ NN: Processes: Abs. Another jerk . In: Der Spiegel . No. 43 , 1970, pp. 128-131 ( online ).
  8. ↑ NN: Banken: Paragraph. Absolutely pure . In: Der Spiegel . No. 46 , 1970, pp. 119-120 ( online ).
  9. ↑ ... is to be executed! A profile of the German class justice system. Berlin 1981, new edition 2006.
  10. ^ Friedrich Karl Kaul: People in front of the court. A pitaval from our day . 4th edition. Verlag Das Neue Berlin, Berlin 1987, ISBN 3-360-00069-2 , p. 177-235 .
  11. ^ Jochen Staadt : A German brotherhood in arms . Article in FAZ No. 231 of October 5, 2007, p. 12.
  12. ↑ Example: Broadcast on October 10, 1974 . Ask Professor Kaul in the TV wish list : 117 episodes, broadcast 1972–1981. Retrieved October 20, 2016.
  13. ^ Film portal : Kaul as Friedrich Karl Hartmann. Retrieved October 20, 2016.
  14. ↑ Sascha Topp: History as an argument in post-war medicine: Forms of visualization of National Socialist euthanasia between politicization and historiography . V&R unipress GmbH, 2013, ISBN 978-3-8471-0127-7 ( google.se [accessed on August 3, 2020]).
personal data
SURNAME Kaul, Friedrich Karl
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hartmann, Friedrich Karl
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German lawyer and writer of the GDR
DATE OF BIRTH February 21, 1906
PLACE OF BIRTH Poses
DATE OF DEATH April 16, 1981
Place of death East Berlin