Reich Security H.Q. Berlin, 5th November, 1942
II A 2 No. 567/42-176
EXPRESS LETTER.—SECRET.
To: (a) the Higher SS and Head of Police,
(b) Commanders and Inspectors of the Security Police and
Security Service (SD), '
(c) the Directors of the State Police (Control) Stations,
. (d) Officers commanding the Security Police and Security
Service (SD),
(e) Directors of the Criminal Investigation Police (Control) Stations,
(f) Directors of the Security Service (Control) Sections. For information to the offices I, III, IV and V—five copies each—.
Re.' Jurisdiction over Poles and Eastern Nationals.
I. The Reichsfuehrer SS. has come to an arrangement with the Reich Minister of Justice Thierack whereby the justice waives the execution of the usual penal procedure against Poles and eastern nationals. Those persons of alien race are in future to be handed over to the police. Jews and gypsies are to be treated in the same way. This agreement has been approved by the Fuehrer.
A settlement is now being worked out for carrying out this agreement by the Reich Security H.Q. on the one hand, and the Reich Ministry of Justice on the other, which settlement is as far as possible to enter into force by 1 January 1943.
II. This agreement is based on following considerations: Poles and eastern nationals are alien and racially inferior people living in the German Reich territory. As a result, considerable risks arise of crises endangering German civil order which are bound to lead to nationals of an alien race being subjected to a penal jurisdiction other than that for the German people.
This need has hitherto not been fully realized. Only for Poles has a special regulation been made in the penal sense by the order concerning the administration of jurisdiction against Poles and Jews in the annexed eastern territories of 4 Dec. 1941 (R.G.B1.—German Official Journal, I. p. 759). But this special regulation does not completely solve the problem either, which arises through Germans living together with people of an alien race. It merely creates more stringent penal regulations and a penal procedure more simplified in part, for Poles. It, however,
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evades the main issue, viz.: that persons of an alien race, for reasons of public interest, are to be treated in an entirely different way from German people, as, at bottom, despite all increased rigours, it applies the characteristic features of the administration of German penal law to Poles.
In adjudicating a punishable offence committed by a Pole, the same views, therefore, still obtain in principle as hold good in adjudicating a German, i.e., the judge takes the person of the offender as his starting-point and tries by a thorough valuation of the offender's personal motives to find an expiation for the deed in accordance with the interests of the people's community.
Such considerations which may be right for adjudicating a punishable offence committed by a German are, however, wrong for adjudicating a punishable offence committed by a person of alien race. In the case of punishable offences committed by a person af alien race the personal motives actuating the offender must be completely eliminated. The only standard may be that German civil order is endangered by his action, and that consequently preventive measures must be taken to prevent the recurrence of such risks. In other words, the action of a person of alien race is not to be viewed from the angle of judicial expiation, but from the angle of the police guard against danger.
As a result of this, the administration of penal law for persons of alien race must be transferred from the hands of the administrators of justice into the hands of the police.
III. Above expositions are for personal information. In case of need, however, there need be no hesitation in informing the gauleiter in suitable form.
By order:
(signed) Streckenbach
Certified Kausch Office clerk.
[Rubber Stamp:
The Reichsfuehrer SS. and Chief of the German Police at the Reich Home Office— eagle and swastika]
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