Senior Reich Attorney
The Oberreichsanwaltschaft was a higher authority of the German Reich in the business area of the Reich Chancellery ; from 1918 it was assigned to the division of the Reich Ministry of Justice . According to Section 143, Paragraph 1, No. 1 of the Courts Constitution Act (GVG), old version (old version), the Oberreichsanwaltschaft was the prosecution at the German Reichsgericht . The first official of the Oberreichsanwaltschaft was the Oberreichsanwalt. In the Third Reich , the Attorney General also acted as the prosecuting authority at the People's Court(VGH). The Oberreichsanwalt had several Reich attorneys according to § 145 GVG a. F. assigned as his representative.
Management and supervision
The Upper Reich Prosecutor's Office was set up at the Reich Court in 1877 as part of the Reich Justice Act. The Reich Chancellor directed and supervised the Upper Reich Attorney and the Reich Attorneys in accordance with Section 148 No. 1 GVG a. F. In the absence of a Ministry of Justice, the Reich Chancellor was responsible for directing and supervising until the end of the Empire . The Reich Justice Office was only a department of the Reich Chancellery.
appointment
According to § 150 Abs. 1 GVG a. F. the Upper Reich Attorney was appointed by the Kaiser on the proposal of the Federal Council. As a political official , the Oberreichsanwalt could according to § 150 Abs. 2 GVG a. F. be put into temporary retirement at any time by imperial order. The same was true of the Reich Lawyers. According to Section 149 (2) of the GVG a. F. have the qualification to hold the office of judge, although they were not judges (Section 149 (1) GVG old version). Senior Reich attorneys had the same rank and salary as the Reich Court President, Reich attorneys that of a Reich Court Counselor.
Duties of the Attorney General
The Oberreichsanwalt was locally responsible for the entire Reich territory, factually responsible for those areas that were heard before the Reichsgericht (Section 143 (1) GVG old version). In contrast to the Federal Prosecutor's Office according to § 142a GVG today , the Oberreichsanwalt did not exercise the office of public prosecutor for criminal matters for which the higher regional courts have jurisdiction ( § 120 (1) GVG). The Oberreichsanwalt could not, like the Federal Public Prosecutor in the context of § 120 Abs. 2 GVG, justify the first instance jurisdiction of the Higher Regional Courts by taking on the prosecution due to particular importance and thus establish the factual jurisdiction himself according to § 142a GVG (so-called approved state security offenses ). Compared to the federal attorney general , the importance of the senior Reich attorney was therefore less.
Prosecution and Investigative Authority
The Oberreichsanwalt exercised the function of a prosecution and investigative authority in the case of tasks in which the Reich Court of First Instance pursuant to §§ 143 Paragraph 1 No. 1, 136 Paragraph 1 No. 1 GVG a. F. was responsible. The first instance jurisdiction was according to § 136 No. 1 GVG a. F. only given in cases of high treason and treason directed against the emperor or the empire.
Participation in the revision procedure
The Oberreichsanwalt had the participation in revision matters before the criminal senates of the Reichsgericht according to §§ 143 Abs. 1 Nr. 1, 136 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 GVG a. F. inside. The Reichsgericht was a court of appeal against judgments
- of the criminal chambers of the regional courts in the first instance, insofar as the jurisdiction of the higher regional courts was not justified (Section 136 (1) No. 2 Alt. 1 GVG old version) (Note: The competence of the higher regional courts was based on Section 123 No. 3 GVG a F. against first instance judgments of the criminal chambers only if the revision was based exclusively on the violation of a legal norm of a state law);
- against the judgments of the jury courts ;
- against judgments of the criminal chambers of the regional courts in the appellate instance in criminal matters for violating the regulations on the collection of public charges and inclines flowing into the Reich treasury, provided that the decision of the Reich Court is requested by the public prosecutor when the files are sent to the appeal court (Section 136 subs . 2 GVG old version).
For the appeal against judgments of the criminal chambers in the appellate instance, according to § 123 No. 2 GVG a. F. the higher regional courts, and thus according to § 143 Abs. 1 GVG a. F. the public prosecutor's offices are responsible.
Authority of the senior realm attorney
The Oberreichsanwalt was the first official of the Oberreichsanwaltschaft to issue official instructions to the Reich attorneys. This authority, which is a matter of course based on the hierarchy principle, is provided by Section 147 (1) GVG a. F. clear. According to § 147 Abs. 2 GVG a. F. the Oberreichsanwalt was entitled to issue instructions to all officials of the public prosecutor's office if the Reichsgericht had jurisdiction in the first instance (high and state treason cases against the emperor and the empire).
Reference time
In this article, the jurisdiction of the Oberreichsanwalt refers to the legal situation of 1877.
Oberreichanwälte
Oberreichanwälte at the Reichsgericht
| No. | Surname | Taking office | Term expires |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | August Heinrich von Seckendorff (1807-1885) | 1879 | 1885 |
| 2 | Hermann Tessendorf (1831–1895) | 1886 | 1895 |
| 3 | Oskar Hamm (1839-1920) | 1896 | 1899 |
| 4th | Philipp Justus von Olshausen (1844–1924) | 1899 | 1907 |
| 5 | Arthur Zweigert (1850-1923) | 1907 | 1920 |
| 6th | Ludwig Ebermayer (1858–1933) | 1921 | 1926 |
| 7th | Karl August Werner (1876–1936) | 1926 | 1936 |
| 8th | Emil Brettle (1877-1945) | 1937 | 1945 |
Oberreichanwälte at the People's Court
| No. | Surname | Taking office | Term expires |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Friedrich Parey (1889–1938) | 1937 | 1938 |
| 2 | Ernst Lautz (1887–1979) | 1939 | 1945 |
Due to his activities at VGH in the years 1939 bis 1945 the senior prosecutor Ernst Lautz in was judges' trial of 1947 because of war crimes and for crimes against humanity, sentenced to prison ten years.
Reich attorneys at the People's Court
The Upper Reich Attorney at VGH was divided into five departments, corresponding to the number of VGH senates, in which seventy “higher officials” were employed. There were five public prosecutors and one Reich attorney in each department. The senior Reich attorney was represented in the process by a Reich attorney. Reich attorneys and department heads at the VGH were Oswald Rothaug (from 1943) and from 1938 to 1944 Paul Barnickel , who moved to the Reichsgericht as a Reich attorney in 1944.
Further lawyers (of approx. 120):
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- Public Prosecutor Baron Hermann Karl Schenck zu Schweinsberg was the prosecutor's representative at the People's Court in 1938
- Public prosecutor Karl Bruchhaus (1903–), since 1939, was involved in at least 33 death sentences (later public prosecutor in Wuppertal).
- Public Prosecutor Ernst Drullmann (1904–1946), representative of the prosecution in the trial of Max Josef Metzger
- Chief Public Prosecutor Wilhelm Eichler
- Reich Attorney Paul Franzki (1891– † unknown)
- Ernst Friedrich (sentenced to prison in the GDR)
- District Judge Erich Geißler (1898– † unknown) (sentenced in the GDR 1982 to a prison sentence of 15 years)
- Eduard Guntz (1904– † unknown) (later in Munich Higher Regional Court Councilor)
- Wilhelm Gustorf (1898–1971) (later district court director in Wuppertal)
- District Judge Willmar Haber (1903– † unknown)
- Chief Public Prosecutor Wilhelm Huhnstock (1891– † unknown) (sentenced to prison in the GDR)
- Reich Attorney Kurt Jaager (1904– † unknown) (including 1957–1959 1st Public Prosecutor of the Schleswig-Holstein Public Prosecutor's Office)
- Senior Reich Attorney Paul Jorns (1871–1942)
- Public Prosecutor Wilhelm Klitzke (1899– † unknown) (sentenced to death in the GDR 1950 before the Chemnitz Regional Court)
- Gerd Lenhardt
- Kurt Naucke (sentenced to prison in the GDR)
- Heinrich Felix Parrisius (March 24, 1885–1976), Reich Attorney since 1937, Deputy Attorney General
- Paul Picke (1898– † unknown) (later President of the Senate at the Higher Regional Court in Saarbrücken)
- District Court Judge Otto Rathmayer (1905–)
- Franz Schlüter (1907– † unknown) (later in Munich Senate President at the Federal Patent Court)
- Alfons Sack (1887–1944) was previously also a lawyer, including in the Reichstag fire trial
- District court judge Edmund Stark , prosecutor in the trial against the European Union resistance group , later district court director in Ravensburg .
- Reich Attorney Albert Weyersberg (1887– † unknown)
literature
- Lore Maria Peschel-Gutzeit (ed.): The Nuremberg jurists judgment of 1947: historical context and current references. 1st edition. Nomos-Verlag, Baden-Baden, 1996. ISBN 3-7890-4528-4
- Hansjoachim W. Koch, People's Court. Political Justice in the Third Reich , Munich Universitas 1988, ISBN 3-8004-1152-0
Individual evidence
- ↑ Johann von Treutlein-Moerdes (1858–1916): The public prosecutor's office at the Reichsgerichte, in: The first 25 years of the Reichsgericht, special edition of the Saxon Archives for German Civil Law on the 25th anniversary of the highest German court of law, p. 109.
- ↑ Juristen judgment, p. 173
- ↑ Information taken from Günther Wieland : That was the People's Court. Investigations, facts, documents. Staatsverlag der DDR, Berlin 1989, ISBN 3-329-00483-5 . There on pages 161 to 167 a list of names of around 120 public prosecutors and around 90 judges, some of whom were also public prosecutors before. At Hansjoachim W. Koch, People's Court , 65 judges, 76 prosecutors and 162 honorary judges are listed by name
- ↑ Leaflet from the senior attorney at the People's Court in criminal case X (offense: high treason)
- ↑ Brown Book. War and Nazi criminals in the Federal Republic and West Berlin . 3rd edition Berlin (East) 1968, p. 118 ( text on the Internet ( Memento of March 3, 2011 in the Internet Archive )). For litigation involvement, see Wanda Kallenbach , Alois Geiger and Elisabeth Pungs
- ^ A b Günther Wieland : That was the People's Court: Investigations - facts - documents . State publishing house of the German Democratic Republic, Berlin 1989, ISBN 3-329-00483-5 , p. 129 .
- ↑ Klaus Godau-Schüttke: I only served the law. The "renazification" of the Schleswig-Holstein judiciary after 1945 , Baden-Baden Nomos-Verlag, 1993, pp. 116–122
- ↑ Juristen judgment, p. 175; Parrisius lost the trial for his pension, Frankfurter Rundschau, August 28, 1968; NSDAP # 2431287
