Kurt Behling

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Kurt Behling (born December 4, 1906 in Thorn in West Prussia , † 1975 in Hamburg ) was a German lawyer. During the National Socialist era , Behling was a criminal defense lawyer at the People's Court . After the end of the war he defended several defendants in the Nuremberg trials .

Life

Kurt Behling received his doctorate in law . After completing his studies, he worked for AEG for several years . From 1938 to 1945 he was a defense lawyer at the People's Court in Berlin . Among other things, Behling and Thomas Dehler campaigned unsuccessfully for the pardon of Hans Wölfel, who was sentenced to death on May 10, 1944 for " decomposing military strength " . According to his own statements, Behling applied for admission as a defense attorney for the defendants of July 20, but was rejected by Roland Freisler .

In the spring of 1947 he moved from Berlin to Nuremberg after the former State Secretary for Justice Franz Schlegelberger had requested him to reinforce his defense in the legal process . Accredited defenders of Schlegelberger were Egon Kubuschok and Hubertus Janicki. In the Krupp trial his client Ewald Loeser was , this time Behling acted as principal defense counsel . In the OKW trial , Behling defended the defendant Field Marshal Georg von Küchler . Finally, he represented in RuSHA process the oberführer Konrad Meyer .

After his time in Nuremberg, Behling returned to West Berlin as a lawyer , where in 1951 he headed the Berlin legal protection office to help individual political prisoners in the GDR . On the west side, this facility was a forerunner organization for the organized release of prisoners . However, Behling's proposal to establish a direct connection to East Berlin met with resistance in Bonn , as this would have contradicted the non-recognition of the GDR. He later settled in Hamburg-Sasel and was the managing director of the Federal Association of the German Yeast Industry from 1956 to 1966. In the 1970s, he was also the Federal Foreign Office's trust lawyer and tried to get Germans detained in Eastern Bloc countries to be released. He was also in contact with the East Berlin negotiator Wolfgang Vogel .

Publications

  • The Nuremberg legal ruling . In: " SchlHA ", 1948, p. 37ff.
  • Nuremberg teachings . In: “Juristische Rundschau”, Volume 1949, Issue 16, pp. 502–505, doi : 10.1515 / juru.1949.1949.16.502
  • The guilty verdicts in the Nuremberg jurist judgment of 4th / 5th December 1947 . In: AVR , Vol. 2 (1950), p. 412 ff.
  • The Nuremberg Judgments . In: Wilbourn E. Benton (Ed.): "Nuremberg: German Views of the War Trials". Southern Methodist University Press, Dallas 1955, pp. 177ff.

literature

  • Hubert Seliger: Political lawyers? : the defenders of the Nuremberg trials . Baden-Baden: Nomos, 2016 ISBN 978-3-8487-2360-7 , p. 537

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kösener Corpslisten 1996, 90 , 171
  2. ↑ a b page no longer available , search in web archives: Chronicle@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.zeit.de . In: "Die ZEIT", No. 48/1956 of November 29, 1956.
  3. ↑ a b personal details . In: "Hamburger Abendblatt" of December 3, 1966.
  4. ↑ a b c Freisler did not understand him . In: Der Spiegel . No. 51 , 1947 ( online - 20 December 1947 ).
  5. ^ Udo Wengst: Thomas Dehler 1897–1967 . Oldenbourg, Munich 1997, ISBN 3486563068 , p. 71.
  6. ↑ Records of the United States Nuremberg War Crimes Trials , Vol. 3, United States Government Printing Office , District of Columbia 1950, p. 14 . (Volume 3 of the " Green Series ")
  7. ↑ Records of the United States Nuremberg War Crimes Trials , Vol. 9, US Government Printing Office, District of Columbia 1950, p. 6 ( Memento of September 8, 2012 in the Internet Archive ). (Volume 9 of the " Green Series ")
  8. ^ Records of the United States Nuremberg War Crimes Trials , Vol. 10, US Government Printing Office, District of Columbia 1950, p. 9 . (Volume 10 of the " Green Series ")
  9. ^ Records of the United States Nuremberg War Crimes Trials , Vol. 4, US Government Printing Office, District of Columbia 1950, p. 607 . (Volume 4 of the " Green Series ")
  10. ↑ Tobias Wunschik: Political prisoners as the plaything of politics . In: Helmut Wagner (Ed.): "Europe and Germany - Germany and Europe". LIT Verlag, Münster 2005, ISBN 3825885836 , pp. 375–376.
  11. ^ Lawyer helped Cuba prisoner . In: "Hamburger Abendblatt" of July 27, 1974.
  12. ^ Norbert F. Pötzl: Bazaar of the spies: the secret missions of the GDR negotiator Wolfgang Vogel . Hoffmann and Campe, Munich 1997, ISBN 3455150195 , pp. 39–41.
personal data
SURNAME Behling, Kurt
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German lawyer
DATE OF BIRTH 4th December 1906
PLACE OF BIRTH Thorn
DATE OF DEATH 1975
Place of death Hamburg