Frankfurt Auschwitz trials

This article is about the trials held in West Germany. For the Polish Auschwitz trials, see Auschwitz trial.
Frankfurt Auschwitz trials
Bürgerhaus at Frankenallee in Frankfurt am Main-Gallus in 2009, the courthouse for the first Frankfurt Auschwitz trial in 1963–65.
CourtFrankfurt, West Germany
Full case name Second Auschwitz trial (der zweite Auschwitz-Prozess)
Indictment20 December 1963
Decided19 August 1965
Case history
Subsequent actionVerdict in the last Auschwitz/Lagischa case: September 1977

The Frankfurt Auschwitz trials, known in German as Der Auschwitz-Prozess, or Der zweite Auschwitz-Prozess (literally, the 'second Auschwitz trial'), was a series of trials running from 20 December 1963 to 19 August 1965, charging 22 defendants under German criminal law for their roles in the Holocaust as mid- to lower-level officials in the Auschwitz-Birkenau death and concentration camp complex. Hans Hofmeyer led the "criminal case against Mulka and others"[This quote needs a citation] (reference number 4 Ks 3/63) as chief judge.

Overall, only 789 individuals of the approximately 8,200[1] surviving SS personnel who served at Auschwitz and its sub-camps were ever tried, of whom 750 received sentences.[2] Unlike the first trial in Poland held almost two decades earlier, the trials in Frankfurt were not based on the legal definition of crimes against humanity as recognized by international law, but according to the state laws of the Federal Republic.[3]

  1. ^ "News / Museum / Auschwitz-Birkenau".
  2. ^ Rees, Laurence (2005). Auschwitz: A New History. New York: Public Affairs. pp. 295–296. ISBN 1-58648-303-X.
  3. ^ Shik, Naama (2014). "The Auschwitz Trials". Yad Vashem, International School for Holocaust Studies. Archived from the original on 5 January 2018. Retrieved 12 October 2014.