On the afternoon of December 20th, Robert Storey began his presentation to the Tribunal outlining the Case against the Gestapo. “The presentation of evidence on the criminality of the Geheime Staatspolizei (Gestapo) includes evidence on the criminality of the Sicherheitsdienst (SD) and of the Schutzstaffeln (SS), which has been discussed by Major Farr, because a great deal of the criminal acts were so inter-related.
The Gestapo was first established in Prussia on the 26th of April 1933 by the Defendant Goering with the mission of carrying out the duties of the political police with, or in place of, the ordinary police authorities. The Gestapo was given the rank of a higher police authority and was subordinated only to the Minister of Interior, to whom was delegated the responsibility of determining its functional and territorial jurisdiction. That fact is established in the Preussische Gesetzsammlung of 26 April 1933, Page 122, and it is our Document 2104-PS. [http://avalon.law.yale.edu/imt/12-20-45.asp#gestapo accessed 12-17-2015] Following Farr’s example, Storey also outlined the background, purpose, organization and activities of the Gestapo for the Tribunal in order to establish the role of the Gestapo within the Third Reich. The presentation had reached the point of describing the “infamous death vans” as described in Document 501-PS at the close of the court day at 4pm
at which the president of the Tribunal adjourned the proceedings until January 2, 1946, when Storey planned to continue his Case against the Gestapo, a film of which is available oneline (Day 25).
–Owen Doremus and Betsy Pittman
[Owen Doremus, a junior at Edwin O. Smith High School, is supporting this blog series with research and writing as part of an independent study.]
The majority of the letters from Tom Dodd to his wife Grace have been published and can be found in Letters from Nuremberg, My father’s narrative of a quest for justice. Senator Christopher J. Dodd with Lary Bloom. New York: Crown Publishing, 2007.
Images available in Thomas J. Dodd Papers.