Oswald Rothaug (17 May 1897 – 4 December 1967) was a Nazi jurist.

Life

Rothaug was born in Mittelsinn,

Bavaria Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total lan ...

. In June 1933, Rothaug was named a

prosecutor A prosecutor is a legal representative of the prosecution in states with either the common law adversarial system or the Civil law (legal system), civil law inquisitorial system. The prosecution is the legal party responsible for presenting the ...

Nuremberg Nuremberg ( ; german: link=no, Nürnberg ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the second-largest city of the German state of Bavaria after its capital Munich, and its 518,370 (2019) inhabitants make it the 14th-largest ...

, and in April 1937, he became the regional court director in Schweinfurt and director of Nazi "special courts" or "''

Sondergericht A ''Sondergericht'' (plural: ''Sondergerichte'') was a German "special court". After taking power in 1933, the Nazis quickly moved to remove internal opposition to the Nazi regime in Germany. The legal system became one of many tools for this ai ...

e''" at Nuremberg. In 1938, he became a member of the German

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that crea ...

, though he had applied the previous year. He worked closely with the ''

Sicherheitsdienst ' (, ''Security Service''), full title ' (Security Service of the ''Reichsführer-SS''), or SD, was the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany. Established in 1931, the SD was the first Nazi intelligence organization ...

'' or intelligence apparatus of the

Nazi SS The ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS; also stylized as ''ᛋᛋ'' with Armanen runes; ; "Protection Squadron") was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany, and later throughout German-occupied Europe dur ...

.Ernst Klee: ''Das Personenlexikon zum Dritten Reich. Wer war was vor und nach 1945''. Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, Zweite aktualisierte Auflage, Frankfurt am Main 2005, , S. 510. In 1942, he sentenced a 25-year-old Polish slave labourer to death, explaining that "the inferiority of the defendant is clear as he is a part of Polish sub-humanity". Rothaug sought after and presided over the trial of Leo Katzenberger in March 1942, ordering his execution for "racial defilement" in May 1943. Rothaug accused the elderly Jewish man of having sexual relations with a younger German woman, Irene Seiler, which was a crime in Nazi Germany according to the

Rassenschande ''Rassenschande'' (, "racial shame") or ''Blutschande'' ( "blood disgrace") was an anti-miscegenation concept in Nazi German racial policy, pertaining to sexual relations between Aryans and non-Aryans. It was put into practice by policies like ...

or "racial purity" laws, a part of the

Nuremberg Laws The Nuremberg Laws (german: link=no, Nürnberger Gesetze, ) were antisemitic and racist laws that were enacted in Nazi Germany on 15 September 1935, at a special meeting of the Reichstag convened during the annual Nuremberg Rally of ...

. Both Katzenberger and Seiler denied the accusations. Following the trial, Rothaug was brought to Berlin as a member of the Nazi People's Court. During the

Judges' Trial The Judges' Trial (; or, the Justice Trial, or, officially, ''The United States of America vs. Josef Altstötter, et al.'') was the third of the 12 trials for war crimes the U.S. authorities held in their occupation zone in Germany in Nurem ...

at Nuremberg, Rothaug was sentenced to life imprisonment on 14 December 1947 for

crimes against humanity Crimes against humanity are widespread or systemic acts committed by or on behalf of a ''de facto'' authority, usually a state, that grossly violate human rights. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity do not have to take place within the ...

. He was the only defendant to be convicted of crimes against humanity, but acquitted of war crimes. Nonetheless, the court commented in its judgment that: His sentence was later reduced to 20 years, and he was released on parole on 22 December 1956.

Death

Rothaug died in

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western States of Germany, state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 m ...

on 4 December 1967, aged 70.

Cultural references

Rothaug's role in the Katzenberger trial was inspiration for the plot surrounding the fictional characters Ernst Janning and Irene Hoffman Wallner in the 1961 film ''

Judgment at Nuremberg ''Judgment at Nuremberg'' is a 1961 American epic courtroom drama film directed and produced by Stanley Kramer, written by Abby Mann and starring Spencer Tracy, Burt Lancaster, Richard Widmark, Maximilian Schell, Werner Klemperer, Marlene Dietr ...

''.

References

Bibliography

Ernst Klee Ernst Klee (15 March 1942, Frankfurt – 18 May 2013, Frankfurt) was a German journalist and author. As a writer on Germany's history, he was best known for his exposure and documentation of medical crimes in Nazi Germany, much of which was concer ...

: ''Das Personenlexikon zum Dritten Reich. Wer war was vor und nach 1945?'' S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2003, . * Kohl, Christianne, "The Maiden and the Jew", Hoffman und Campe, Hamburg, 1997. {{DEFAULTSORT:Rothaug, Oswald 1897 births 1967 deaths People from Main-Spessart German people convicted of crimes against humanity German prisoners sentenced to life imprisonment Prisoners sentenced to life imprisonment by the United States military People convicted by the United States Nuremberg Military Tribunals Judges in the Nazi Party