Heinz Hugo Hoffmann

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Heinz Hugo Hoffmann (born June 13, 1906 in Mainz , † probably December 28, 1986 ) was a German lawyer who was an associate judge at the Nuremberg Special Court during the “Third Reich” .

Life

Training and work

Heinz Hugo Hoffmann grew up in Darmstadt . He studied law at the universities of Frankfurt am Main , Munich , Geneva and Giessen . He went to Great Britain on a scholarship ; he wrote his doctoral thesis on English administrative law . Between 1934 and 1938 he worked as a public prosecutor in Offenbach . Initially with a “moderate-liberal” attitude, Hoffmann turned increasingly to German-national views after the Nazis came to power. In 1937, Hoffmann, in response to a request addressed to all officials, joined theNSDAP , also in the expectation that this would advance his career. In 1938 he came to Nuremberg as a regional judge and in 1940 became an assessor at the special court. Hoffmann was married and a father of two.

In March 1942 appeared Hoffmann as Associate Justice on the special court Nuremberg in the chaired by Oswald Rothaug run show trial against the Jewish Nuremberg merchant Leo Katzenberger and photographer Irene Seiler , where violations of the " Blood Protection Law ", in the case of Leo Katzenberger also a violation against the " People's Pest Ordinance " were charged with. Katzenberger was sentenced to death in March 1942 by Rothaug and the two assessors, Karl Josef Ferber and Heinz Hugo Hoffmann.

post war period

After the end of the Second World War , Hoffmann was dismissed from the civil service, settled in Darmstadt , was initially unemployed as a lawyer and began training as a bricklayer .

Hoffmann was interviewed as a witness in March 1947 as part of the “ Nuremberg Legal Trial ”. His detailed statements on a total of twelve death sentences from the Nuremberg Special Court make Hoffmann's participation as an assessor in further death sentences appear to be entirely possible and also largely certain. In public, however, only his participation in the Katzenberger trial was discussed. The defendant Seiler described Hoffmann in his testimony as a " sexually accessible woman who offers very little resistance to a man's wishes". The judge's verdict in the Katzenberger trial was "unsatisfactory and depressing" for him; From his current point of view, the judgment was "intolerable, unjust and inhuman". However, when he reached his judgment, he felt “bound by the law, also with regard to racial disgrace”. In his testimony, Hoffmann refused to share responsibility for himself; his role was that of a "little assessor" who could not do anything wrong. He was solely responsible for the death sentences on Rothaug, "against whose extraordinary energy it was not possible to come." Hoffmann also stated that he had only agreed to the death sentence under pressure from Rothaug.

Legal processing

From 1950 Hoffmann ran his own law firm in Darmstadt , which he later expanded into a law firm. He continued to run this law firm later as a senior partner, albeit with limited health. An activity until the end of the 1970s is proven.

In April 1960, shortly before the expiry of the limitation period (15 years), the Nuremberg Public Prosecutor's Office initiated an investigation against Rothaug, Ferber and Hoffmann for " perversion of justice , willful homicide and aiding and abetting ". At the end of 1967, the Nuremberg public prosecutors finally presented the indictment in which Ferber and Hoffmann were named as suspects; Rothaug died in early December 1967. In the spring of 1968 the trial of Ferber and Hoffmann was opened. In the trial before the Nuremberg-Fürth regional court, Hoffmann asserted that he “even found it“ humanly ”a relief in the context of the judgment at the time that Katzenberger, as a Jew,“ was a dead man anyway ”under the circumstances, regardless of the verdict of the special court would fail ”. In April 1968 Ferber and Hoffmann were convicted of manslaughter in a less serious case. Hoffmann was sentenced to two years in prison; an arrest warrant but not fared. After prosecution and defense auditors had inserted, the raised Bundesgerichtshof (BGH), the Nuremberg Ersturteil on in August 1970 and remitted the case to the circuit court back: It should be considered whether a base motive had been committed and a conviction was displayed for murder. After Ferber, who was now 69 years old, was found to be unable to stand trial because of calcifications in the brain and severe joint changes in the spine , a decision was made to hire Hoffmann, against which the two daughters of Katzenberger, however , appealed as joint plaintiffs .

The proceedings against Hoffmann continued; However, he also tried to evade the proceedings because of illness. In January 1972 Hoffmann was therefore examined by an official doctor in Darmstadt ; the ability to negotiate was determined. In January 1973 the new trial against Hoffmann began before the Nuremberg jury court . It was the last trial brought against a former Nazi judge in the Federal Republic of Germany. Because of a spinal disc disease , Hoffmann was now only “partially negotiable”. From the summer of 1973 Hoffmann was treated in a sanatorium for neurological-psychiatric ailments in Hofheim am Taunus . Shortly before the scheduled date for the pleading in November 1973, Hoffmann submitted another certificate that declared him to be "incapable of negotiating" because of a "depressive syndrome" with "psychomotor inhibition" in the brain. In August 1976 the proceedings against Hoffmann were finally abandoned by a decision of the 5th criminal chamber of the LG Nuremberg Fürth; an extensive psychological report had determined that he was permanently unable to stand trial. The LG based its decision not on Hoffmann's “physical need for help”, but rather on his “intellectual and emotional disorders”. The accused was to be regarded as incapable of standing because of his "organic brain age reduction for a long, factually complicated and emotionally stressful court hearing", according to the court, which did not follow the application of the public prosecutor's office, which had initially only applied for a temporary incapacity to act.

Hoffmann continued his legal practice, albeit with reduced capacity, in "emotionally uncomplicated cases for him" even after the termination of the proceedings before the Frankfurt Higher Regional Court . It was not until January 1985, when Hoffmann was 79 years old, that the Nuremberg public prosecutor Ludwig Prandl concluded the proceedings that had been pending for 25 years with the note: "His act remains unpunished."

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The presentation of Hoffmann's biography essentially follows the accounts by Ernst Klee and Christiane Kohl given in the “Literature” section . In addition, several internet sources were consulted.
  2. ↑ Ernst Klee, citing the Federal Archives , Ludwigsburg branch, states 1968 as the year of death. Since Hoffmann was demonstrably still alive at this point in time, it can be assumed that there was a transmission or printing error, or simply a number rotated.
  3. ↑ a b REVIEW: SACHBUCH: Blood Justice and Data Protection . In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung of September 5, 1998. Retrieved on February 3, 2018.
  4. ↑ Nuremberg Special Court . Entry with overview. In: Inventory of archival sources of the Nazi state . Part 1: Reich central authorities, regional authorities and scientific universities for the ten West German states and Berlin. Page 233. Publisher: De Gruyter Saur. ISBN 978-3-11-095039-7 . (accessed via De Gruyter Online)
  5. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j "A young lady with an easy way of life" . In: DER SPIEGEL of January 22, 1973. Edition 4/1973. Retrieved February 3, 2018.
  6. ^ The wording of the judgment of the Nuremberg Special Court of March 23, 1942 . Retrieved February 3, 2018.
  7. ↑ Kohl 2002, p. 307.
  8. ↑ a b Kohl 2002, pp. 306/307.
  9. ↑ Kohl 2002, p. 256.
  10. ↑ Kohl 2002, p. 306.
  11. ↑ Kohl 2002, p. 341.
  12. ↑ Kohl 2002, p. 318.
  13. ↑ Kohl 2002, pp. 326/327.
  14. ↑ a b c d Kohl 2002, p. 327.
  15. ↑ Kohl 2002, p. 259.
  16. ↑ Regina Ogorek: “Rassenschande” and legal method: The argumentative grammar of the Reichsgericht when applying the Blood Protection Act of 1935 . In: Critical quarterly for legislation and jurisprudence . Volume 86 (2003). Issue 3. Pages 279–289. Retrieved February 3, 2018.
  17. ^ Julius Schoeps : Justice and National Socialism. Stuttgart 1987, ISBN 3-922801-36-6 , p. 113.
  18. ↑ Kohl 2002, p. 330.
  19. ↑ Kohl 2002, pp. 332/333.
  20. ↑ a b c d Kohl, p. 333.
  21. ↑ Kohl 2002, pp. 338/339.
  22. ↑ Kohl 2002, pp. 340/341.
  23. ^ A b c Jörg Friedrich : acquittal for the Nazi judiciary: the judgments against Nazi judges since 1948. A documentation. Ullstein Verlag 1998, p. 394. ISBN 978-3-54826-532-2 (with detailed biography).
  24. ↑ Hoffmann must therefore still have lived in 1985, so that Ernst Klee (p. 264) is probably confusing 1968 and 1986.
  25. ↑ Review . In: Die Zeit , October 23, 2003
personal data
SURNAME Hoffmann, Heinz Hugo
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hoffmann, Heinz-Hugo (rare variant)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German lawyer
DATE OF BIRTH June 13, 1906
PLACE OF BIRTH Mainz
DATE OF DEATH uncertain: December 28, 1986
Place of death uncertain: Darmstadt