Willi Dreßen

Willi Dreßen (* 1935 in Eschweiler ) is a German public prosecutor and from 1996 to 2000 was the head of the central office of the state justice administrations for the investigation of Nazi crimes in Ludwigsburg .

Life

Dreßen studied at the Universities of Cologne and Bonn law . From 1967 until his retirement in 2000 he worked as a public prosecutor at the Central Office for the Investigation of National Socialist Crimes in Ludwigsburg, from 1985 as the deputy head of the authorities and from 1996 to 2000 as head of the Central Office .

Dreßen also emerged with specialist publications based on the documents of the Ludwigsburg central office . His document collection “Schöne Zeiten”, published together with Ernst Klee, found the greatest degree of circulation . The murder of Jews from the perspective of the perpetrators and gawkers .

When he retired in 2000, Dreßen was disappointed that after more than thirty years of his own public prosecution work in the Ludwigsburg authority, over 100,000 preliminary investigations were carried out, but only 6,500 convictions of Nazi perpetrators were made.

In 2006 Willi Dreßen received the Order of Merit of the State of Baden-Württemberg, the highest award in the State of Baden-Württemberg .

Publications (selection)

• with Ernst Klee : "God with us". The German War of Extermination in the East 1939–1945. S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1989, ISBN 3-10-039305-8 .
• with Volker Rieß: exploitation and extermination. Health policy in the General Government. In: Norbert Frei (Ed.) Medicine and Health Policy in the Nazi Era. R. Oldenbourg Verlag, Munich 1991 (= writings of the quarterly books for contemporary history. Special issue), ISBN 3-486-64534-X , pp. 157–171.
• The Holocaust in Slovakia and the German justice system. In: Yearbook for Research on Antisemitism . Volume 7. Edited by Wolfgang Benz . Campus, Frankfurt am Main 1992, pp. 93-102.
• Problems and experiences of the investigators in clearing up NS violent crimes. In: Archives for Police History. 1994, pp. 75-83.
• The Federal Republican case law in matters of Nazi "euthanasia". In: Christoph Kopke (Ed.): Medicine and crime. Klemm and Oelschläger. Ulm 2001, ISBN 3-932577-32-9 , pp. 288-299.

literature

• Annette Weinke : A society investigates against itself. The history of the central office in Ludwigsburg 1958–2008 (= Forschungsstelle Ludwigsburg . Volume 13). Scientific Book Society, Darmstadt 2008, ISBN 978-3-534-21950-6 .

Web links

• Disappointed balance sheet. The head of the Nazi investigation office is retiring , HaGalil , August 30, 2000.