1947-01-16, #2: Doctors' Trial (late morning)
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again is session.
MR. HOCHWALD: If the Tribunal please, I should like to have the certification of the signing of Document 1533-PS signed by Mr. Neibergall.
DR. GEORG FROESCHMANN: Dr. Froeschmann, counsel for Viktor Brack Mr. President, during the recess I have just had the opportunity of receiving the extensive document, 1533, and of reading it over carefully. document and which are supporting the allegations of the prosecution towards Viktor Brack, I want to request that Kurt Gerstein be called here as a witness and then the prosecution discontinue the reading of this decument and further that the part of the document which has already been read be crossed from the record. In my opinion if things of such importance are to be made credible here by testimony which has not been sworn to, such a document is not suitable for consideration as evidence before this Tribunal.
THE PRESIDENT: Counsel, I understand, is referring to Document Number 1533-PS?
DR. FROESCHMANN: Yes, I am. May I say something in addition, Mr. President? Dr. Boehm and I are not quite clear whether this document was presented through the International Military Tribunal Number and if it was taken into the record. As long as I am still in doubt, the document appears still as unsuitable to be presented here as evidence.
I made a mistake before. I was reffering to the International Military Tribunal.
THE PRESIDENT: The certificate attached to this document shows that it was introduced in evidence as Exhibit Number RF-350 before the International Tribunal. The objection to the admission of the document is overruled; and the document will be admitted in evidence in this case. It seems to the Tribunal that the man who made this statement, Gerstein, could be a very important witness before this Tribunal and that if he is available as a witness, his attendance should be procured. If counsel for any defendant will request that he be called as a witness for the purpose of cross examination by the defense, the Tribunal will give serious consideration to such a request.
Meanwhile the exhibit is admitted in evidence.
MR. HOCHWALD: If your Honors please, I have in the meantime soon the certification on Document NO-896, which was offered into evidence as Prosecution Exhibit 427. The certificate from the chief prosecutor in Frankfurt is in German. May I read the translation in to the record? The certificate reads:
Certificate. I, Public Prosecutor Dr. Walter Wagner, testify that the attached copy is a correct and true copy of document from Volume III, consisting of three pages. I received the original document in the course of the execution of my official duties. The original is among the files of the proceedings for AJS-3-46; and it is needed for other purposes. Frankfurt, 4 January 1947. The chief prosecutor at the county court by order /s/ Dr. Walter Wagner, Prosecutor.
To this is attached the stamp of the county court in Frankfurt.
DR. ROBERT SERVATIUS: Dr. Servatius for the defendant Karl Brandt. Mr. President, the fact that this document NO-896 has been certified to be a true document by the court does not stand in any connection with its value of evidence and the question of the admissibility of the document. This interrogation before the prosecution would not be permissible as evidence and would not be admitted before a German court. Before a German court the witness would have to be called and the reading of this interrogation would not be permissible. I believe that the Tribunal will have to proceed in a similar manner because only in this rap will the true reproduction of the interrogation be secured.
THE PRESIDENT: Has counsel for the prosecution any further argument in support of the introduction of this exhibit?
MR. HOCHWALD: I'm sorry, your Honor, I didn't hear.
THE PRESIDENT: Has counsel for the prosecution any further argument in support of the admission of this exhibit?
MR. HOCHWALD: The only argument is that I was informed that everyone who is heard in such a case is warned that he has to say the truth; and I do think that it is absolutely the procedure and is a very similar one to the procedure adopted for the obtaining of affidavits for the defense counsel. I respectfully summit that the credibility of the public prosecutor who was taking this statement, together with the court reporter has no less weight than the credibility of every one of the defense counsel who is permitted to take an affidavit in the interest of his client for evidence in this court.
DR. SERVATIUS: Mr. President, this is not a case of the credibility of the district attorney but of the credibility of the person who was interrogated. There if defense counsel is entitled to accept an affidavit, then the person who is being interrogated knows that he will be punished if he makes any false statements. If somebody is being interrogated before the prosecute, then he knows that he cannot be punished in any way if he states the untruth. Therefore the situation is completely different.
THE PRESIDENT: The objection to the admission of the Exhibit No.427 offered in evidence is sustained. The exhibit will not be admitted. The Prosecution, of course, will have the right to offer later any other certified statement or record of this if it is in any wise amplified as without prejudice to the offer of the exhibit in any subsequent form as would care to be made.
MR. McHANEY: I think the Tribunal's remarks cover what I was about to say. We will endeavor to locate the person who gave this statement, have him sworn, and then sign a statement in similar form, and we would like leave to be able to submit that into the record after we close our case in chief.
THE PRESIDENT: Tho course suggested by the Prosecution will be followed. Any other exhibit may be offered after the close of the case of the Prosecution in chief, subject, of course, to any cross examination or objection by the defense counsel.
MR. HOCHWALD: Tho next document I want to offer into evidence is on Page 155 of the Document Book, Document 1556-PS, which will be Prosecution Exhibit 427. This report of the United Nations War Crimes Commission was already admitted into evidence in the first trial before the International Tribunal under the Exhibit Number USA 716. I would like to road from Annex B, which is on Page 158 of the document. It is on Page 158 of the document: "Detailed statement on the murdering of ill and aged people in Germany. Annex B.
1. The murdering can be traced back to a secret law which was released sometime in summer, 1940.
2. Besides the Chief Physician of the Reich, Dr. L. Conti, the Reichsfuehrer SS Himmler, the Reichs Minister of the Interior Dr. Frick as well as other men, the following participate on the introduction of this secret law.
a. Tho Councillor of the Ministry Dr. Herbert Linden of the Reich Ministry of the Interior
b. Dr. Staehle-Nagold, the Chief Physician of Wuerttemberg.
c. Councillor of Medicine Dr. Hermann Pfanmueller, Director of the Sanatorium and Nursing Institution Eglfing-Haar near Munich.
d. Professor Dr. Werner Heyde, Director of the Psychiatric and Neurological Clinic in Wuerzburg.
To characterize Dr. Conti, who was her in Tessin, it may be added that he changes his name from Leonhard to Leonardo, according to the change in the German people's feelings, the friendship of the Axis or to the change of feelings in the European community.
3. As I hare already stated, there were after careful calculation at least 200,000 mainly mentally deficient, imbeciles, besides neurological cases and medically unfit people, these were not only incurable cases, and at least 75,000 aged people.
4. The murders were mainly accomplished in Muensigan/Wuerttemberg and Linz on the Danube; several gas-chambers with cremation chambers directly attached were constructed there. As the gas chambers are next to the training grounds of the troops in Muensigen, it is believed that the mentally deficient who were murdered there were used for experimenting with now poison gasses.
5. The transport from the institutions to the gas chambers is carried out by SS Kommandos. These call themselves Geminnuetzige Transport A.G., Berlin, Luetzowufer. This Limited Company also stores the individual medical case histories of the murdered inmates of the institutions.
6. The inmates of the many smaller and middle-sized institutions were murdered almost without exception. The larger institutions are partly - to keep up the pretense to the outside world - still at hand, but they now have only a friction of the original number of heir inmates; for example there are now only some 500 inmates instead of 2,500 in Berlin-Buch; in Stadtroda/ Thueringen only about 150 instead of 600; in Kaufbeuren/Bayern only 200 instead of 1,000 etc. Of the larger Sanatoriums and Nursing Institutions the following were already closed dawn completely same time ago; Illenau/Baden 800 inmates; Berlin/Herzberge 2500 inmates, Kreutzburg/Oberschlesion 1500 inmates; Sonnenstein/Sachsen 800 inmates; Werneck/Unterfranken-Bayern 1111 inmates; Steinhof/Wien 3000 inmates, and others, most probably now also Schleswig with 1000 beds, Guenzburg with 400, etc.
7. The following procedure is popular with old people, who are still perfectly healthy and who possess their own flat: the competent "political lender" reports then for welfare purposes; then a physician, usually an SS doctor who establishes "the fact" that the old people are mentally deficient, appears; he suggest in Court that they are to be put under tutelage and that they are to be sent to a nursing home. This suggestion is naturally put into force. The old people are then sent from the nursing homo to the gas chambers.
8. Partly a very indirect procedure for killing these old people is used. For example a quite sudden transfer of a home for aged people in a very short period is very popular, this being often ordered and carried cut in only a few hours, in the hope that through the excitement already a part of the old people will be killed by an apoplectic fit. The home for aged people is also frequently transferred into promises which are absolutely insufficient as far as sanitary conditions are concerned; another way is that suddenly all the nursing staff are called up for work in the Red Cross or in a munitions factory and the helpless patients are left to look after themselves.
Written in December 1941. Signed, Dr. T. Lang.
This concludes the presentation of Document Book No. 15. The Prosecution will call now the witness Dr. Schmidt.
DR. GAWLIK (Counsel for the Defendant Hoven): Gawlik for the defendant Hoven. Mr. President, Exhibit Document NO 907 was presented as Exhibit 412 on page 39 of the German Document Book, Volume 16, and it dealt allegedly with letters from Dr. Menecke. This morning I received a photo copy of the document. I have not been able to obtain the original document. I saw from this that not the original letters were presented, but only typed conies of these letters. I do not consider this permissible to be presented as evidence as long as the original letters of Dr. Menecke are not presented. I therefore request that Document NO 907 be crossed out from the record.
MR. McHANEY: The document to which defense counsel has reference is on page 45 of the English Document Book. The facts are these: the letters of Menecke were apparently found in his home or some other place by German authorities. Excerpts were taken from those letters and used in the trial against him in Frankfurt. We obtained the excerpts only from the authorities in Frankfurt. However, Menecke is now in Nuernberg and he was shown these excerpts and he has certified that they are true and correct excerpts from letters which he wrote. The originals are not available to us. I submit that the certification of Menecke himself makes this document admissible.
JUDGE SIEBRING: Is Menecke to be called as a witness, Mr. McHaney?
MR. McHANEY: Yes, he is, Your Honor.
JUDGE SIEBRING: Defense counsel then will have opportunity to examine Menecke with respect to these letters if he so chooses.
DR. GAWLIK: Mr. president, it is my opinion that the Prosecution then should Question the witness about the contents of these letters; that, however, it is not permissible to present this document as long as we do not have the original letters.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will reserve its ruling until after the proposed witness Menecke has testified. Mr. McHaney, did I understand that the exhibit offered as 427, Document 1556-PS, was introduced in evidence before the International Tribunal?
MR. McHANEY: Yes, that is correct, Your Honor.
THE PRESIDENT: The copy of the English Document Book contains no certificate whatever showing anything of the sort. Does the original document have attached to it the proper certificate?
MR. McHANEY: The original document has -
THE PRESIDENT: I mean the original exhibit offered before this Tribunal.
MR. McHANEY: Yes, it has the certificate of Fred Niebergall stating it was offered in evidence before the IMT as Republic of France Exhibit 350, I believe. I am sorry, Your Honor, I misunderstood you. You have reference to 1556 PS. I was speaking of 1553 PS, the Gerstein -- I do not know whether the one we have there does show that it came from the records of the IMT.
THE PRESIDENT: It has a certificate. It bears a certificate with a stamped signature. You should have the certificate properly signed. There was nothing in the English Document Book indicating that it had ever been shown to the International Military Tribunal.
MR. McHANEY: That is correct.
THE PRESIDENT: I understand the Prosecution now desires to call Witness Eugen Schmidt.,
MR. McHANEY: That is correct.
THE PRESIDENT: The Marshal will summon the Witness, Walter Eugen Schmidt.
WALTER EUGEN SCHMIDT, a witness, took the stand and testified as follows
BY THE PRESIDENT:
Q: The Witness will rise, hold up her right hand, and be sworn. Repeat after me:
I swear by God, the Almighty and Omniscient, that I will speak the pure truth and will withheld and add nothing.
(The witness repeated the bath.)
THE PRESIDENT: Be seated, please.
DIRECT EXAMINATION
BY MR. McHANEY:
Q: Witness, your name is Walter Eugene Schmidt?
A: My name is Walter Eugen Schmidt.
Q: Are you a German citizen?
A: I am German, Yes.
Q: You were born on 9 June 1911 Wiesbaden, Germany?
A: I was born on 9 June 1911 at Wiesbaden.
Q: Are you the same alter Schmidt who was recently tried for a crime in Frankfurt before a German Tribunal?
A: Yes. I am the same Dr. Schmidt who was sentenced to life imprisonment at Frankfurt for performing Euthanasia on children.
Q: Are were tried for the crime of murder, Witness?
A: Yes. I was tried for murder.
Q: What is the status of your case now?
A: I have been called here as a witness, at this time. I have not made an appeal up to now.
Q: Witness, will you tell us, briefly, something about your personal history?
A: In 1939, I joined the Waffen-SS. There I reached the grade of assistant physician and Sturmfuehrer. In 1941, an order from the Reich Chancellery reached me. It was sent to my Troop Commander. I was to report to the Reich Chancellery.
Q: Witness, may I interrupt you a moment? Before we come to those matters, I would like to ask you, whether you have been educated as a doctor of medicine?
A: I started at the Frankfurt University. I studied medicine there. I have taken my state examination, I took it there. I also passed my doctor's examination with distinction.
Q: When did you pass your doctor's examination?
A: I passed that in 1937 at the University Clinic.
Q: Where have you practiced medicine since 1937?
A: In Frankfurt at the University Clinic as voluntary assistant. Then in - February of 1939, I was sent to the institution at Eichberg as assistant physician.
Q: Has Eichberg an insane asylum?
A: Eichberg was an institution for the insane and the imbeciles owned by the state. Afterwards, it was also a sanatarium with a department for little children and later on it was turned into an SS field hospital.
Q: Witness, you stated that you joined the Waffen SS in 1939?
A: Yes, I was conscripted into the Waffen SS as a member of the NSSP unit.
Q: How long were you on duty with the Waffen SS?
A: I remained with the Waffen SS until 1941.
Q: What month of 1941?
A: Until March or April. Then I was called back. Then I was discharged from the Waffen SS in September 1941.
Q: What happened in March or April 1941? Has that the date on which you were called to Berlin?
A: I did not understand the question. Will you repeat it please?
Q: What happened in March or April, 1941? as that the date on which you were called to Berlin?
A: I was called to Berlin in March; 1941, yes.
Q: By when were you called to Berlin?
A: By order of ay- civilian office. It was sent by way of the Adjutant of the Wehrmacht.
Q: What did you do in Berlin. Why were you sent there?
A: I was to report there to see a Doctor Blankenburg. However, this nan was absent, so first of all I went home to my institute. From there I was sent with my chief to Berlin to the Reich Chancellery.
Q: You state that you were ordered to report to a Dr. Blankenburg in Berlin.
A: No. This time it was a meeting. It was a meeting in the Reich Chancellery in which about 50 or 60 chief physicians and directors of the German insane institutions participated. Furthermore, representatives from the Reich Chancellery, Ministry of Interior, and Ministry of Justice were also present. I was told that.
Q: When did this conference or meeting take place, Witness?
A: I assume that this must have been in the early summer.
Q: Early summer of 1941, is that correct?
A: Of 1941, yes.
Q: Was the meeting held in the Chancellery of the Fuehrer in Berlin?
A: It was held in the Fuehrer's Chancellery in Berlin.
Q: And can you tell us some of the names of the people who attended this meeting?
A: Yes. I can remember that professor Nietsche was there and Professor Heyde, Professor Schneider, Dr. Heffelmann, and Dr. von Hegener. The following men came with me to Berlin, they were directors: Dr. Pfannmueller, Dr. Falkenhauser, Dr. Schneider, Dr. Schiesse, and Dr. Menneke. The district counsel for Wiesbaden, Bernotat was there. These are tile people who were there that I know for certain.
Q: Row many people would say attended this meeting?
A: I assume about 50 or 60.
Q: At that time, were you Deputy to Dr. Menneke at the Eichberg Asylum
A: At that time, Dr. Menneke was the Director at Eichberg. At that time, I was still the assistant physician. It was only about half a year later that I became senior physician. I remained that until the end, when in 1944, I was appointed Deputy Chief physician. Then I went back into the field again until 1945.
Q: Did I understand that you were recalled from the Waffen-SS to take this job as an assistant to Dr. Menneke at Eichberg?
A: No. I did not know anything about that. I only received a letter from Dr. Menneke, that he intended to have me called "indispensable." At that time I wrote him I preferred to remain with my unit. However, one day the order reached me. It was a telegram. "Where is Dr. Schmidt"? In accordance with this, my Troop Commander immediately sent me on my way. He sent no home.
Q: Who was chairman of this Meeting in Berlin in the summer of 1941?
A: Who was the Director of the Conference? The Conference was introduced by a gentleman I do not remember anymore today. No. I cannot recall his name at all. It was then continued by Heyde, I believe, and afterward by Dr, Heffelmann. It was more or less an open Conference.
Q: Who was Dr. Heyde?
A: As far as I know, ha was the University Professor from Wuerzburg.
Q: Who was Dr. Heffelmann?
A: Dr. Heffelmann was a juristic representative of the Reich Chanceller at least that is what I considered him to be.
Q: What was done at this meeting?
A: It was a meeting about the Euthanasia question, and execution of these measures in the German Asylums on insane people.
Q: Well, was any explanation given of the Euthanasia program at this meeting?
A: I have not quite understood. Will you repeat the question, please?
Q: Well, was any explanation given of the Euthanasia program?
A: Yes, a law of the Fuehrer was read to us, Furthermore, further decrees wore read, decrees which were to be the legal basis for the execution of the Measures. Then this question was also discussed.
Q: Do you remember the content of this decree or law as you call it? What did it say?
Q: Do you remember what was the contents of this Fuehrer's Decree or law, as you called it. What did it say?
A: It was for the incurable, and those people who were severely sick that should be given final medical aid, and. it also stated who were and were not empowered in the decree. The decree will show it bore the address of Professor Brandt.
Q: Will you state about this Fuehrer's Decree, whether it was directed to Professors Brandt and Bouhler?
A: Yes. I have recently seen this Decree, and it bore the address of Professors Brandt and Bouhler. However, I believe that there still had been another decree which did not bear any address at all.
Q: Now, witness, I do not want you to testify to anything that you have been shown recently. I asked you if you remembered the contents of the Decree which was read in this meeting?
A: Yes, the contents stated that they ere to be empowered to give them a final medical aid of euthanasia on incurable inmates or patients.
Q: Do you remember?
A: I am quite sure I can remember that.
Q: Do you remember whether that Decree was directed to Bouhler and Brandt?
A: I cannot state it with certainty. That is only what I have seen recently.
Q: Was an explanation given how the euthanasia program was operated?
A: Yes. I remember it this way; that intermediary stations wore to be establishes in individual institutions, and that from there the patients were to be sent to the euthanasia institutions.
Q: Well, did they explain that questionnaires were to be filled out on paper.
A: This action had already been completed at this period of time.
Q: What action do you refer to - what action is that, witness.
A: I refer to these intermediary stations. They told me of that institution where the patients had already been moved. However, then other patient were to arrive there from our institutions who were then sent from our institutions to the euthanasia institution.
Q: Do I understand that Eichberg was to be made a collecting station for insane persons?
A: Yes, that is what it was.
Q: And that then these insane persons were to be sent from Eichberg to the extermination station?
A: Yes, they were to be sent from us to these institutions.
Q: And on what basis was it to be determined that this or that patient should be sent from Eichberg to the extermination station at that time?
A: These stations had already been treated on questionnaires, and by diagnosis the Reichsarbeitsge-Weinschaft, the Reich Labor Corporation, had already been examined.
Q: You mean to say, that the questionnaires had been filled out on these patients before they arrived at Eichberg?
A: Yes, the questionnaires has already been completed, and diagnosis had already been made before they came to Eichberg. In a certain way it was an intermediary station.
Q: Witness, I shall ask you to pause after the question has been put to you before you answer, do you understand that?
A: Yes.
Q: Now I take it from what you have said that you know how the euthanasia program operated prior to the time that the patients arrived at Eichberg. Can you tell us what was done with respect to an insane person before the patient was sent to Eichberg?
A: It was done this way. The directors of the individual asylums had to fill in questionnaires, and these questionnaires were then submitted to Berlin. Then special experts gave a diagnosis, and they had to make a diagnosis of these questionnaires, They then had to decide whether the individual was to be sent to the 'euthanasia station to an institute like Muenster, Gastein, and Eicheiborn, and so on, or, then whether to send these patients who had been described as positive to an euthanasia station. Part of these people were sent to Vietstein near Muenster, Eichberg, or Scheuern, and from there they were to be sent to Hadamar. That is just about as much as I know about our vicinity.
Q: Hadamar was actually a place where patients were killed, is that correct?
A: Yes, Hadamar was the euthanasia institution.
Q: That was the euthanasia institution in your area?
A: Yes, that was the euthanasia institution for our district until August 1941.
Q: And that was the district surrounding the Weisbaden area?
A: Yes, everything was sent there from even other districts. I don't know what was the basis for this procedure.
Q: Have you ever heard of the Institution Grafeneck?
A: No, I had not heard of it. I only knew at that time Hadamar.
Q: I am not asking you what you knew at that time. I am asking you now if you heard during the time that you were active in the euthanasia program of Grafeneck?
A: The name came to my attention afterwards. However, I have never visited the institute.
Q: Well, did you hear that Grafeneck was also an extermination institute like Hadamar?
A: Yes.
Q: Did you hear of the same thing about Brandenburg?
A: No, I don't know that name.
Q: Or Hartheimer?
A: Yes.
Q: Or Sonnenstein?
A: Yes.
Q: Or Bernburg?
A: Yes.
Q: Or Berneck?
A: Yes, also.
Q: What other extermination institutes do you know that existed?
A: Otherwise, I don't know. Others came to my attention in the course of time there.
Q: All right, witness. You said that the asylum filled out questionnaires on patients which were sent to Berlin, is that right?
A: Yes, questionnaires were sent to Berlin.
Q: To whom were they sent in Berlin?
A: I can not say that. I have never sent any there.
Q: Have you ever heard of it?
A: My chief the then Director Dr. Menneke was in charge of having them sent there.
Q: Have you over heard of the Reich Association Hospital and Nursing Establishment?
A: You mean the Reich Corporation for Nursing and Convalescent Establishment?
Q: I mean the Reichsarbeitsgemeinschaft fuer Pflege und Heilanstalten?
A: They were asylums for Hadamar, yes, and also the Gemeinnuetzige, and the Gemeinnuetzige Transport G.M.B.H.; also the Reich Company for Scientific Research; also a department for amalgamation and hereditary diseases.
Q: I thought you probably hoard about those. Now, tell us what they were?
A: So far as I know they were the executing agencies.
Q: They were the agencies in charge of the euthanasia program?
A: Yes. When I attended the conference of the Party in the Chancellery I also asked who was in charge of this assignment, and Dr. Hegener told me it was Professor Brandt; that he had the medical direction, and I also continued on this concept.
Q: Was anything said about the connection of Viktor Brack, then?
A: About the connection, yes, it was stated that he was the medical director.
Q: Now, you are speaking of Viktor Brack, or Karl Brandt?
A: I am speaking about Professor Brandt.
Q: I now put the question to you whether you knew that Viktor Brack was connected with the euthanasia program?
A: Yes. Later on the name of Viktor Brack was mentioned frequently, and Mr. Hegener told me about it, and also told me at a later period of tin during a conference that Brandt was not the director any more, but that Brack was in charge all by himself.
Q: When was that?
A: It must have been in 1944.
Q: Was von Hegener a subordinate of Viktor Brack?
A: It was Hegener subordinated to Viktor Brack. I only know this from Hegener when I had a discussion with Hegener about the subject.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will now recess until 1:30.