Hans Laternser

Hans Laternser (born August 3, 1908 in Diedenhofen , † July 21, 1969 in Frankfurt am Main ) was a German lawyer. Laternser became known as a criminal defense lawyer in Nazi trials and war crimes trials . He played a central role in the Auschwitz trials of the 1960s .

Life

Education and time of National Socialism

Hans Laternser studied law at the universities of Frankfurt , Marburg and Berlin . After completing his legal clerkship at the Cologne Higher Regional Court, he received his doctorate in Marburg in 1932 on a civil law topic. Since 1934 he worked as a lawyer in Wiesbaden in his own law firm specializing in tax law.

During the Second World War , Laternser was used from 1939 in France, the Soviet Union and the Balkans. Most recently he was an air instructor in the rank of first lieutenant in the 29th Air Force Jäger Regiment . At the beginning of May 1945 Laternser was taken prisoner by the Americans, in which he was until the end of June of the same year.

After 1945

Admission as a lawyer

Since no membership in the NSDAP was proven, he was one of the first attorneys to receive admission after the end of the Second World War - under Allied jurisdiction, non-membership was a decisive criterion for obtaining admission as a lawyer. The question of Laternser's actual party membership is, however, controversial. The fact that he had to answer in a denazification process shows that the Chamber suspected NSDAP membership. On the other hand, Laternser testified before the Wiesbaden Chamber of Arbitration and Appeals that he "consciously prevented my acceptance into the NSDAP through deliberate passivity with regard to the further formalities required for acceptance." Specifically, Laternser proceeded in such a way that he applied for membership in 1933, but did not submit the required passport photo despite repeated requests. Therefore, he never received a party book or badge. During the Nazi era he was able to refer to the application made, but after the fall of the regime he was never officially a member of the party. In the denazification process, he was assigned to Group V (exonerated) on the basis of the statement by Otto John - the first President of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution - that he had a convincing attitude against National Socialism. Nevertheless, he was listed as a former party member by the US prosecution during the Nuremberg Military Tribunals.

Laternser immediately became one of the most important defense lawyers in war crimes trials. He saw himself as a politically active lawyer and had close ties to the political right. He was close friends with the right-wing extremist publisher Gerhard Frey , whose lawyer he was also.

First processes

The subject of the first trial after the end of the Nazi regime, in which Laternser appeared as a defender, were crimes within the framework of the "euthanasia" program . Laternser represented two employees of the Hadamar killing center before an American military court in the state house in Wiesbaden . In the years 1945–1948 he represented doctors and members of the nursing staff of the Eichberg asylum , the Kalmenhof and the asylum in Hadamer in Frankfurt am Main . In these first trials, the main question was whether and to what extent criminal prosecution was still possible without new, retroactive criminal provisions. Specifically, it was about the legality of Hitler's "euthanasia" order . Laternser argued in particular with the lack of orders, internal conflicts of the defendants and with the fact that Hitler's will already had the force of law, since a state leadership in possession of actual power could arbitrarily set law - an argument that in a similar form u. a. was represented by Carl Schmitt .

Nuremberg Trial of Major War Criminals

→ Main article : Trial of the Wehrmacht High Command

Laternser's career was significantly influenced by his role at the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg, before which the Nuremberg Trials took place from November 20, 1945 to October 1, 1946 . With these he was defender of the general staff and high command of the armed forces . When he appeared in the Wiesbaden trial, he was noticed by the Deputy Chief Prosecutor of the Military Court, Robert Kempner . He proposed the then 38-year-old Laternser at short notice as defense attorney for the General Staff and the High Command. The position was remunerated with 3,500 marks for the first and 1,750 marks for a second client as well as cigarettes, food receipts and alcoholic beverages. From mid-1946 to 1947 he defended Max Ilgner in the IG Farben trial before resigning from his mandate due to overwork.

Laternser, whom the American chief prosecutor Telford Taylor described as an "exceptionally capable and energetic" lawyer, built the defense on three pillars: firstly, the fundamental questioning of the jurisdiction of the courts and thus the international law conformity of the courts; secondly, the accusation that the jurisprudence of the Allies violated the the principle of equality under international law and, thirdly, the introduction of the principle of legality . Other arguments Laternser used were the need for orders and the attempt to shift responsibility onto Adolf Hitler and the SS. He also tried to acquit the army of war crimes .

Auschwitz trial

Laternser took over the defense of five former SS men during the 1st Auschwitz Trial from 1963 to 1965. These were the defendants Pery Broad , Victor Capesius , Klaus Dylewski , Willy Frank and Willi Schatz , who were charged with selections on the ramp of the Auschwitz concentration camp. Laternser appeared as an "opponent" of the East Berlin attorney Friedrich Kaul , who took part in the proceedings as a joint plaintiff .

On the one hand, Lanternser's strategy consisted of filing a large number of applications, complaints from the supervisory authority and procedural complaints. On the other hand, he claimed that all the witnesses who appeared from the Eastern Bloc countries were communists, the statements had been discussed and therefore insignificant, even though the interrogation protocols were used by Laternser to prove alleged contradictions.

Further processes

After the trials in Nuremberg, the proven defense attorney became active in further trials. He defended Albert Kesselring in Venice, Erich von Manstein , Otto Wagener in Rome, Hasso von Manteuffel and Friedrich Wilhelm Heinz, among others .

Further work

After the end of the Nuremberg trials, he joined the Heidelberg legal circle . From 1955, he was talking to Fritz Steinacker as a partner, the firm Dr. Laternser & Steinacker in Wiesbaden, from 1969 in Frankfurt am Main.

In Krumey-Hunsche process defended Laternser 1965 Otto Hunsche and reached in the first instance acquittal. In 1968 he took over the defense of the former diplomat Horst Wagner from the lawyer Ernst Achenbach . The process was then led by his partner Fritz Steinacker alone , as Hans Laternser died of heart failure on July 21, 1969 while he was familiarizing himself with the 20 volumes of files and 20,000 documents.

Fonts

• The other side in the Auschwitz Trial in 1963/1965. Seewald, Stuttgart-Degerloch 1966.
• Defense of German soldiers. Appeals to Allied Courts. Bohnemeier, Bonn 1950.

literature

• Karl Ritter von Klimesch (ed.): Heads of politics, economy, art and science. Volume 2. Naumann, Augsburg 1953. p. 649.
• Devin O. Pendas : The Auschwitz Trial: Genocide in Court. Siedler Verlag, Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-8275-0007-6 .
• Hubert Seliger: Political lawyers? The defenders of the Nuremberg trials. Nomos, Baden-Baden 2016, ISBN 978-3-8487-2360-7 , p. 545.

Web links

• Literature by and about Hans Laternser in the catalog of the German National Library

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Christian Dirks: Selekteure as a lifesaver. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser. 'In: Irmtrud Wojak (Ed.): “We hold a court day over ourselves ...”. History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz Trial. 2001, p. 186.
2. ↑ Final report to the Secretary of the Army on Nuernberg war crimes trials under Control Council Law , Vol. 10. United States Government Printing Office , Washington DC 1950, p. 324.
3. ↑ Christian Dirks: Selekteure as a lifesaver. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser. In: Irmtrud Wojak (ed.): “We hold a court day over ourselves ...”. History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz Trial. 2001, p. 164.
4. ↑ Hans Laternser: The presumptions of § 1362 BGB and their scope . Langendreer, Bochum 1932. (Dissertation)
5. ↑ Dirks, Christian: selectors as lifeguards. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser , in: Wojak, Irmtrud (ed.) 2001: "We hold court days over ourselves ..." History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz Trial, p. 164.
6. ^ ^{A b c} Christian Dirks: Selectors as lifeguards. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser. In: Irmtrud Wojak (ed.): “We hold a court day over ourselves ...”. History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz Trial. P. 165.
7. ↑ ^{a b} Heike Krösche: When in doubt for the accused? Lines of defense and motives in the OKW process using the example of Hans Laternser. In: Kim Christian Priemel, Alexa Stiller (ed.): NMT: The Nuremberg Military Tribunals between History, Justice and Righteousness. Hamburger Edition, Hamburg 2013, ISBN 978-3-86854-260-8 , p. 611.
8. ↑ quoted from Christian Dirks: Selectors as lifesavers. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser , p. 186, footnote 8.
9. ↑ Dirks, Christian: selectors as lifeguards. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser , in: Wojak, Irmtrud (ed.) 2001: "We hold a court day over ourselves ..." History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz Trial, p. 165 f.
10. ↑ Dirks, Christian: selectors as lifeguards. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser , in: Wojak, Irmtrud (ed.) 2001: "We hold court days over ourselves ..." History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz trial, p. 167 f.
11. ↑ Dirks, Christian: selectors as lifeguards. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser , in: Wojak, Irmtrud (ed.) 2001: "We hold court days over ourselves ..." History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz Trial, p. 168.
12. ↑ Dirks, Christian: selectors as lifeguards. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser , in: Wojak, Irmtrud (ed.) 2001: "We hold court days over ourselves ..." History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz trial, p. 168 f.
13. ↑ Dirks, Christian: selectors as lifeguards. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser , in: Wojak, Irmtrud (ed.) 2001: "We hold judgment day over ourselves ..." History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz trial, p. 170.
14. ↑ Dietrich Strothmann : The tribunal of lawyers . In: Die Zeit , No. 19/1964.
15. ↑ Dirks, Christian: selectors as lifeguards. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser , in: Wojak, Irmtrud (ed.) 2001: "We hold court days over ourselves ..." History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz Trial, p. 171 f.
16. ↑ Dirks, Christian: selectors as lifeguards. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser , in: Wojak, Irmtrud (ed.) 2001: "We hold judgment day over ourselves ..." History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz trial, p. 170.
17. ↑ According to Fritz Steinacker: http://www.steinackerkoll.de/anwalte/fritz-steinacker
18. ↑ Axel Eggebrecht : Slightly involved in the murder . In: Die Zeit , No. 7/1965.
19. ↑ Christian Dirks: Selekteure as a lifesaver. The defense strategy of the lawyer Dr. Hans Laternser. In: Irmtrud Wojak (ed.): “We hold a court day over ourselves ...”. History and impact of the first Frankfurt Auschwitz Trial. 2001, p. 186.