Trial by the district courts in Klagenfurt, Vienna, Salzburg and Linz against members of the HSSPF Lublin, Volume 3: Trial against Hermann Hoefle; Testimonies by Austrian and German perpetrators, 1961

Documentation from trials conducted in Landesgericht Klagenfurt (the Klagenfurt District Court), Landesgericht Wien (the Vienna District Court), Landesgericht Salzburg (the Salzburg District Court) and Landesgericht Linz (the Linz District Court) against members of the HSSPF (Höhere SS- und Polizeiführer-Higher SS and Police Leader) Lublin: Trial against Hermann Hoefle; Testimonies by Austrian and German perpetrators, 1961 Documentation from a trial conducted against Austrian war criminals, most of whom participated in "Aktion Reinhardt": - Investigation against Hermann Hoefle started in Landesgericht Linz (the Linz District Court) in 1947 (Vg8 6771/47); - Main part of the investigation conducted by Landesgericht Salzburg (the Salzburg District Court) from 1956 (11a Vr 1382/56) and Landesgericht Wien (the Vienna District Court) from 1962 (27c Vr 852/62); - Final investigation conducted by Landesgericht Klagenfurt (the Klagenfurt District Court), 1962-1971 (25 Vr 3123/71); - Transfer of the files to the various courts and emendation of the signatures, as well as commencement of various other trials against other Austrian war criminals during the investigation; - Copying of the documents at Landesgericht Klagenfurt and transfer of the copies to Yad Vashem. The overall arrangement of the files includes three kinds of volumes: - General volumes containing general administrational information regarding the trial, indexes and collections; - Appendix volumes containing statements and information from trials dealing with similar cases from Germany, mostly from Hamburg; This file is part of the Main Volume. This file contains administrational correspondence and documents, copies of Nazi documents from the Nuremberg Trial and statements from witnesses. A detailed and full list of documents can be found in Aktenverzeichnis (Docket) (TR.21/1). Statements of former members of the HSSP Lublin: - Statement by Hermann Worthoff, residing in Moenchen-Gladbach, regarding Hoefle's part in the evacuation of the Warsaw Ghetto, 27 April 1961 (pp. 6-23); - Statement by Waldemar Kiehas, born 26 April 1916, residing in Zwettl/Rodl; Kiehas served in Lublin, 1941-1942, as a police veterinarian, 07 June 1961 (pp. 52-53); Statements by Otto Hantke: - 20 June 1961: Information regarding his personal history; management of a small factory for wires and nails, formerly owned by Jewish brothers named Tuller in Lublin; building of a labor camp for the Deutsche Ausruestungswerke (German Armaments Works) in Lublin; co-manager of a sawmill near Pulawy, based on the labor of 150 Jewish laborers who were later shot; responsibility for the production of textiles in the Stutthof camp; October 1941; - 21 June 1961: Report regarding the shooting of Jewish laborers at a sawmill near Pulawy, October or November 1943; staff at the Lipowa camp: Dolp, Stemmler, Horst Riedel, Mohwinkel, Karl Klein, Offermann, Eugen Lehnert, Adolf Gross, Franz Patezke, Michael Dorndorf, Reiter, Hausberg, Martin Schramm, Neumann and Alfred Koziel; Confrontation with murders Hantke allegedly committed according to other witnesses (e.g. the Jewish dentist Dr. Schindler): denial that inmates in Lipowa were beaten to death, that he beat a Jew named Reis to death, and that he hanged prisoners; admission that Dolp shot Jews; listing of names of participants in the evacuation of the Lublin Ghetto; denial he shot Czech Jews from a transport in Piaski; mention of Krasnik, Konskawola and Budzyn by the interviewer; detailed report of the evacuation of the Warsaw Ghetto, summer 1942, mentioning names of participants: Classen, Meierhofer, Hoefele, Adolf Gross, Slany, Rolixmann, Streibel or Streivel, Schwarzenbacher, Franz, Oberhauser and Brandt; mention that Jews who escaped from transports returned to the Warsaw Ghetto and informed the residents that they were going to be murdered with gas; denial that he killed Jews during the evacuation, despite the reports by many witnesses that he did; information regarding the evacuation of the Warsaw Ghetto; denial by Hantke that he killed Jews in Warsaw or in the Lipowa camp; admission later that he did shoot four sick Jews in a Heikel Flugzeugwerk near Budzyn; report of a shooting in another small town in the area; detailed information regarding the Poniatowa camp and the Toebbens factory; also mentioned: Spiegelstein, Back and Schubert; 23 June 1961: Information regarding a later visit to Warsaw; information regarding Hans Fichna, Walter Ludwig, Meisner, Rudi Neumann and Klein, (pp. 55-90); Statement by Georg Michalsen: 29 June 1961: Detailed report regarding the evacuation of the Warsaw Ghetto; information concerning negotiations with the Judenrat; arrangements for the evacuation; moving of the Toebbens factory and Schulz factory; knowledge of participants in the evacuation; short report regarding the shooting of approximately 20,000 Jews in Riga, winter 1941-1942; names mentioned: Hoefle, Farkas, Czista (Hoefle's dog), Meierhofer, Claasen, Slany, Hantke, Gross, Wirth, Worthoff, Gouverneur Fischer, Von Sammern, Auerswald, Brandt, Gottschalk, Stroop, Globocnik, Dr. Hahn, Jeckeln and Franz; places mentioned: the Stawki hospital, Polski Hotel, Zelasnastrasse and Poniatowa; 30 June 1961: Continuation of the report on the evacuation of the Warsaw Ghetto: Information regarding the deportation of Jewish workers and the shooting of Jews during deportations; names mentioned: Konrad, Claasen, Hoefle, Meierhofer, Dr. Brandt (a Jewish radiologist) Bauch, Kaleske and Jesuiter; 05 July 1961: Information regarding the Toebbens factory: Jews had to pay some kind of “entrance fee” to work in the factory (pp. 96-126); Selection of administrational correspondence and notes: - Photo of Hermann Hoefle (p. 4); - Response from the Yad Vashem Archives to a request regarding documents about Hoefle, 25 April 1961, and excerpt from a protocol from the Eichmann Trial concerning Hoefle, giving information about Eichmann's visit to an extermination camp, guided by Hoefle (pp. 24-29); Copies of Nazi documents: - Collection of Nazi documents from the Nuremberg Trial: - Himmler to Pohl and Globocnik: Correspondence and reports regarding the economic benefit of “Aktion" Reinhardt, 22 September 1943 (pp. 31-52); - Note saying that “ Aktion" Reinhardt is also named “Geheime Reichssache” (Top Secret) (p. 43); - Letter to Odilo Globocnik with congratulations on his success in “Aktion Reinhardt”, 30 November 1943; - Dienstanweisung fuer die Hoeheren SS-u. Polizeifuehrer, Anlage zu O.-Kdo.C Nr.272/39 II, a document regarding the structure of the HSSP, 18 December 1939 (p. 45); - Report on labor camps and Jewish laborers submitted to Dr. Brandt, giving information regarding production in the Poniatowa, Trawniki, Budzyn, and Lublin camps, 21 June 1943 (pp. 46-51); - Note regarding advice from the HSSP Lublin for the evacuation of Jews from Mielec, and giving details about the transport of Jews; names mentioned: Hermann Hoefle, Nemec and Pohl; places mentioned: the Belzec camp, Zamosc, the Trawniki camp, Susiec, the Izbica camp, 17 March 1942 (pp. 93-94).