Court III Case III Final Plea Guenther Joel phrase was placed by Calvin of Geneva in the center of his idea of the State and this was applied later in practice by the Puritans.
The American reporter Knickerbocker, with whom I spent much time in the thirties before Hitler's assumption of power, told in one of his reports, he had observed at the looting of a food store how the looters, men and women, had stood two by two before the door of the store in order to take out gradually the cabbages from the store.
In my book, soon to be published, about the IMT trial, I describe a small episode which took place at the interrogation of Goering. According to this, Goering called out at a difficult question when he was handed a pile of documents for identification: "I'll first put order in this!" The court replied with hilarity but the Germans took this key word of Hitler and Goering seriously.
Goering used it also when he justified the events of 30 June 1934, and the German people accepted this and still much more only because it believed that at last there would bo order, order in contrast to chaos which had arisen in economics and administration since the lost First World War.
And this young assistant judge Joel believed in a better order when he was called to Berlin in the year 1933* In order not to bo on the outside he and all of his associated, upon the advice of bus chief, signed the declaration to join the Party. None of these people read the Party program, even loss Hitler's book "My Struggle". There was one thing that men like Joel were impressed with about Hitler: the way he reached power. In this the former Oberregierungsrat (senior councillor of State) Kempner was mistaken when he prophesied that Hitler was to overthrow the State by force.
10524A Court III Case III Final Plea Guenther Joel Hitler swore in September 1930 when those young Reichswehr officers faced the Reich Supreme Court for having instituted National Socialist cells in the Reichswehr that he would get the power by legal means.
And he kept his oath. Far be it from me to protect those people who put him in the saddle. But from the viewpoint of a German man desiring an orderly State organization, Hitler proved by the fact that after 1930, in spite of all his successes at the election, he did not bring about the violent overthrow, that he was serious about the order.
In Germany the number of unemployed had risen from three million in the year 1930 to five million in the year 1931 and seven million in the year 1932. In the time from 1924- to 1932, 7,692 square kilometers of land, a surface equal to the entire Grand Duchy of Hessen, had been subject to forced sale whereby 100,000 farmers willing to work became proletarians. Again and again the phrase was heard in Germany: "That cannot go on." It is interesting to look at the printed matter of the Reichstag and, removed from the wavering pictures which appear in the facts, as one poet Schiller says: "confused by Party hatred and favor", to convince oneself with one's own eyes what the political opponents of Hitler said at that time in the Reichstag debates. Also, Mr. Wells of the Social Democrats. The basic mood of all these men, as well as of the people, was that it could not go on this way and that they would bestow to the strongest opposition group the right to try a new method for once.
It is psychologically interesting question but not more than that, whether this man Hitler of 1933, surrounded by the cheering crowd, considered already committing all the crimes later which culminated in Auschwitz. But I do not believe that supports can be found for the assertion that 10524B Court III Case III Final Plea Guenther Joel the German people and an assistant judge of the German people could assume this, for the words spoken by Hitler and his promises pointed exactly to the opposite.
He wanted to bring order and a sound legal system, the sound sentiment of the people. It is dangerous to use this word because in the meantime it has been much abused. But it is not uninteresting to point to the almost unknown fact that it was not coined by Hitler but originates with the German draft of a new penal code from the year 1909, when Hitler was 20 years old and vegetated in a Viennese flophouse.
The maxim is valid "By their deeds ye shall know them." Now what was Joel doing in the Department of Justice in 1933? It is the secret of earthly happenings that things happen quite differently from what we imagine. One must admit that the order in the German State system before Hitler's assumption of power left much to be desired, but what came now was a real revolutionary shock, a dissolution of this little and attacked order and a setting up of new principles which in their large conception such as leader principle, responsibility of the individual, offered wide loopholes through which the villainous criminal could slip. Wherever such things happen in the world the evil sadistic elements gather together and for the time being gain the upper hand by their unsrupulousness. As far as we could at that time read forbidden book3 and could keep up our foreign relations, we were shocked by the presentation of a Duesseldorf play called "The Soldiers of the Moor" which described the conditions at the Esterwege concentration camp. A wild horde of uniformed National Socialists, feeling their power, had been assigned to this camp set up for accommodating workers and had had the idea to collect political opponents and people they did not like, to lock them up and to treat 10524C Court III Case III Final Plea Guenther Joel them badly.
This system was entirely new to us at that time. Joel, an official at the Department of Justice, learned of this affair. The Senior District Attorney with jurisdiction in Osnabrueck had received an anonymous report, but was unable to do anything about it because the police in Osnabrueck was powerless against the armed mob. At that time Dr. Joel, together with a colleague, was a specialist of the Central Prosecuting Office, which Guertner had set up in order to give support to the local prosecution authorities which, alone and left to themselves, could not do anything against the local Party officers and their favorites.
Dr. Joel went to the Department of Interior and discussed the affair with Secretary Gawert. Then, because the local police could not be entrusted with such a difficult task, he drove with a detail of fifty men of the State police, with arms and ammunition to Osnabrueck and took up positions before Camp Esterwegen. Before the first shots with live ammunition were fired, the gang surrendered and the camp inmates were liberated (Note 56).
But this incident is not isolated. In Bredow near Stettin evil elements, with the approval of the Gauleiter and the chief of police, had set up a similar camp in which members of the Mecklenburg and Pomeranian nobility and other political opponents were maltreated. The senior prosecution attorney and the government district president were unable to do anything Dr. Joel and his associate, von Haacke, took up the matter and Dr. Joel succeeded, with the help of the then-Chief of the Prussian Police, to get through to Goering. Here again a scene of liberation took place; the black guards surrendered, the main culprit, a certain Hoffmann, got fifteen years of hard labor and afterwards Goering was so angry that he had him shot in short shrift on 30 June 1934. Dr. Joel was not 10524D Court III Case III Final Plea Guenther Joel angry, but it casts a bright light on his conception of the dignity of judge and justice that he too protested sharply against this interference in the execution of the judgment.
The court will probably remember the testimony of the witness Schulz, the last witness who was interrogated in these proceedings (Note 57).
A certain irony is not lacking if the indictment discloses that it had been Dr. Joel, of all people, who had recommended to Hitler the pardoning of the guard details of Camp Kemna near Wuppertal (Note 58). The activities of Dr. Joel in Esterwegen and Bredow having been proven, it is not difficult to believe in the evidence about Kemna which again shows that Joel overcame the resistance of the local authorities and urged judicial punishment of these people. He succeeded also in effecting the dissolution of the camp and liberating the inmates and to achieve the removal of the Wuppertal chief of police. But the once started criminal procedure was quashed after a long struggle by Hitler, due to the influence of Party officers. I refer to the evidence presented in my Note 59. There is only one of the documents of the Prosecution which I should like to mention with a few words because this document is important for establishing a starting point for understanding the mode of expression used at that time in the correspondence not only of Joel but also of the other defendants. The report to Hitler of 19 February 1936 (Note 60) was initialled by Joel. It ends with the request to quash the proceedings. But when this report was written in the Central Prosecution Office, the battle of Kemna had already been fought, the camp had been dissolved; however, the Party offices had succeeded in saving their Party members from judicial punishment. The 10524E Court III Case III Final Plea Guenther Joel formal report to Hitler was merely the last stage.
If one reads this report one finds that its description of the facts contains only arguments for the punishment and none for quashing. This goes even so far that this very report was used already in the IMT proceedings as a document for the concentration camp atrocities. If, therefore, the authors of this report seriously wanted to present the quashing to Hitler, they should have had to edit it completely differently in content and wording. This way they put everything in this report that was against the quashing and then voted, one can only say with a certain disdain for the quashing because they had no other choice.
This consideration presents also the conclusions for the correct understanding of the files which accumulated in relation to the punishment of the SA guard details of Camp Hohenstein. Here sentences were meted out by a court, but the Party later succeeded in getting pardons after partial prison terms had been served. The files, the letters of Secretary Guertner to Gauleiter Mutschmann, Reich Minister Hess, Chief of SA Staff Lutze, and to Hitler, submitted in the IMT proceedings and which were written in the Central Prosecution Office, show unequivocally the perfectly correct attitude of not only Joel but also of the judge (Note 61).
The office administered by Joel and his already-mentioned colleague von Haacke in the Central Prosecution Office, also had a struggle with those police officials who maltreated prisoners while interrogating them. As a proof of this activity I had demanded the criminal files, for instance against detectives Winzer, Dunst et al in Berlin and against the detectives Heinemann and Sohnellenberg in Dussseldorf for committing assault and battery while on duty, which according 10524F Court III Case III Final Plea Guenther Joel to Article 340 of the penal code is punishable by not less than three months.
Unfortunately I never received those files. I refer to the evidence in Note 62.
I still should like to point out the letter of Secretary Guertner of 14 May 1935 (Note 63). In this letter any maltreatment or obtaining a statement under duress was rejected and the most severe prosecution of guilty officials was considered proper. This letter was written in Joel's Central Prosecution Office; it boars its file number and indubitably added much in removing bad conditions until later the Gestapo used the concentration camp for its own purpose, against which not only Joel but the entire Department of Justice and the reluctant German people were powerless.
10524G l80ct.
47-M-l-la-GJ- Dr. Carl Haensel Court 3 case 3 Final Plea Guenther Joel The administration of justice received a heavy blow on 30 June 1934, when Hitler for the first time openly arrpgated to himself the powers of a "supreme authority of the law."
Thanks to Goebbels' propagandistic skill, this event came to be known as "Roehm-putsch" (Roehm's coup de main); after the historical clarification through the IHT proceedings - in this connection I refer in particular to the testimony and the book of Dr. Bernd Gisevius whose Swiss affidavit in behalf of Joel was unfortunately repudiated because of a defect in form- one cannot but call it the Go ring-Himmler "putsch", for it was at that juncture that Himmler's political ascendancy beside Go-ring began, Both of them agreed that the opportunity should be seized, not only to liquidate Roehm and his friends, but moreover a number if persons who stood in their way for other reasons.
Hitler justified the events as emergency measures for reasons of state. On 13 July he declared in the Reichstag that he had had to excise an ulcer and the German nation deluded itself with the belief that the longed-for order had come at last and that the legal instability of the period of revolutionary transition was over. Roehm was branded publicly as a criminal on account of his depravity and his sexual aberrations and the German people understood from Hitler's announcements that he had wanted to "purge", and that it was only for reasons of emergency in regard to the state that he liquidated men who would have been condemned anyhow in due process of law. Despite the law of 3 July 1934, minister Guertner had the events clarified. Dr. Joel and Haacke did it on their own initiative, since neither the policy nor any other authority assisted them. Guertner is dead. His personal adviser, Senior Governmental Councillor Dohanyi drew the lesson from those days that the most relentless fight must be waged against Hitlerism and he paid with his life on 20 July 1944, in the sequels of that day. Even Freisler was incensed about these measures and the fourth man who did what he could, 10524H who roused Guertner into action, went with him to Goering, entreated Guertner to use his influence with hitler and actually prevailed on him to do so, is Joel.
In the most emphatic terms minister Guertner demanded the prosecution of those who had committed crimes against persons who were politically troublesome. Only in few cases did Hitler a free to a prosecution on. If at that time Dr. Joel did not give up the fight but attempted, with what means his humble position afforded him, to save the authority of the law it is not, to use the language of Law 10, to be classed as "taking consenting part." He was neither minister nor under secretary, he was only public prosecutor. Nothing can illustrate more strikingly the contrast between "consenting" and "dissenting" than does Dr. Joel's attitude. He actually attempted to institute criminal proceedings according to the law, but the amnesty enforced by Hitler through a law, and the quashing of individual proceedings by Hitler frustrated his efforts (Note 64.)
The evidence proved that Dr. Joel opposed the obstruction of the criminal proceedings not only by derisive and protesting comments, but by deeds. To simplify this, I mention his demand for punishment of the offenses committed against clergymen or members of the Caritas in Munich, against clergymen in State and in the Rhineland. I have made a compilation of exhibits. (Note 65). By courtesy of the public prosecutor in State I obtained several decrees and a section of an indictment signed by Dr. Joel dealing with the diffamation of a clergyman as "Jew mercenary". I could have increased' these exhibits by numerous records of criminal trials, but did not receive them.
As regards his attitude to the Jewish problem I would refer to the Marienburg case as an example (Note 66), and the prosecution for unlawful aryianization of the Jewish businesses in Berlin.
10524-1 At Joel's order the Jewish principles were released from Gestapo detention and high'ranking party officials of the Berlin Gau and a government councillor sentenced to several years of penal servitude.
(Note 67). Joel's attitude is clearly shown, furthermore, by his efforts to bring the persons who had taken part in the excesses against the Jewish population on 9 and 10 November 1938 to trial before the proper judges. Exhibit 557 submitted by the prosecution (Note 68) only confirms Joel's statements which he made during his endeavours and his success in restoring the jurisdiction of the law courts. Those documents show that while the investigations of the policy had first to be submitted to the Supreme Party Court for disciplinary action the courts could make the decision afterwards. Very many criminal proceedings were carried out in this way. In many cases Joel even endeavored locally to see these proceedings through in order to overcome resistance. During the IMT trial, ample evidence to this effect was produced in the committee interrogations. Endeavours to obtain it for the present trial were without result. As Guertner's deputy, Joel can claim credit for having preserved the jurisdiction of criminal jurispridence.
In connection therewith is Joel's activity in Nuremberg aimed at the revocation of the special measures taken by the Gau administration of Franken against Jewish landowners. Joel was member of a commission inquiring into Stretcher's misdeeds, and thanks to its activity it was possible to overthrow this Hitler minion who was all-powerful in Frankonia (Note 70). The material excerpted from the real estate register and the registry of deeds in Nuremberg and presented by the prosecuting authority in the rebuttal (Note 71) could not shake these statements. Some 500 properties were made over to Holz as trustee of the Gau Franken by notarial deed of 4 December 1938.
10524J After the above mentioned commission had determined its activity Holz had to revoke this transfer on 28 April 1980.
That the Jewish landed property was finally expropriated during the subsequent development and that this is shown in later entries in the real estate register is a matter apart from the case of Joel. He is not in any way connected with these subsequent measures under the anti-Jewish legislation. The inclusion in the evidence panel of Mrs. Landsberger which had been criticized by the prosecution (Note 72) is quite irrelevant in this connection. According to the real estate register, Mrs. Landsberger's property was liquidated together with the properties of other Jewish owners on 8 December 1938 and returned to Mrs. Landsberger under the above mentioned revocation of Holz of 28 April 1980. Whether Mrs. Landsberger is only the wife of a Jew or herself Jewish is not shown in the real estate register, but in the real estate records. In 1938 Mrs. Landsberger was treated just like the other Jewish owners. It would not have made any change in the real estate register, if she had been a Jewess. (Note 73).
The defendant Joel was always employed by Minister Guertner whenever attempts were made, through interference by Party offices, to disturb of obstruct the due course of criminal.proceedings. This referred to the criminal cases against those Party minions who were to be granted a special procedure and against whom Dr. Joel, in support of the endangered local prosecuting authorities, took action.
Between 1933 and 1937 his intervention took place within the Central Prosecuting Authority, after its liquidation on 18 October 1937 (Note 75), by order in each individual case. Among the many statements I submitted as proofs of Dr. Joel's activity there are 10524K many instances of the valuable contribution he made towards the preservation of correctness and lawfulness in criminal procedure.
The statements of many chief prosecutors of many towns and of other officials in the administration of justice speak an eloquent language (Note 76). As regards the cooperation between a prosecuting authority and Dr. Joel the report of chief public prosecutor Hattingen of Bonn may be quoted as an example (Note 77).
Whenever in the course of this trial a criminal case in which difficulties with the Party had arisen was submitted no this court for discussion it could be ascertained that Dr. Joel had taken action.
After the outbreak of the war the defendant Dr. Joel continued the above outlined endeavours in support of the local prosecuting authorities as his main field of activity. After the induction of Herr von Haacke who had been appointed special legal adviser for Partial Criminal Law, he took over the latter's division and when the application of the martial laws was running smoothly after a short while Dr. Joel's activity was in the main restricted to was economy cases.
As already mentioned, he made it his special business to deal with the Party bosses who wanted to continue their luxurious life in war time at the expenses of the public. As in any other of his official assignments, Dr. Joel can let his actions speak for himself which show their results in hundreds of criminal case records.
I shall quote two examples. The witness Hoeller describes one of these cases. (Note 78). It refers to the criminal proceedings against the Gau Office Leader of the National Socialist Welfare 10524L Organization and SS-Standartenfuehrer Janowski in Kiel who together with several other Party officials had misappropriated food condiments and clothing which had been prepared for the bombed-out and destitute victims after the first large scale air raid on Luebook in 1942.
High officials of the Party administration in Munich and Berlin tried to thwart the measures of the public prosecutor in Kiel. The Reich Loader of the National Socialist Welfare Organization, Hilgenfeldt, interfered. Also the Gauleiter, Reich Minister Dr. Goebbels opposed the carrying-out of the proceedings. Dr. Joel made a stand for the administration of justice. He webt to Kiel and Luebeck and broke down arising opposition; he went to sec Reich Leader Hilgenfeldt in Berlin to make the demands of the law plain to him in no uncertain terms. And lastly Dr. Joel took issue with Dr. Goebbels in defense of the lawful measures of the public prosecutor in Kiel and also in the face of Dr. Goebbels insisted on the law being carried out. He would let himself be dissuaded by Dr. Geobbels. In the main trial, in which Dr. Joel assisted in person, the Gau Office Leader and two of the codefendants were sentenced to death, the others received terms of hard labor. The Sentence against the Gau Office Leader was carried out, the two other condemned were reprieved and the death sentences commuted to terms of hard labor. (Note 79).
At the same time a criminal case was pending in Berlin which led to equally serious clashes with offices of the NSDAP. The arraigned person was the Gau Office Leader of the National Socialist Welfare Organization in Berlin, Maehler, a close collaborator of Dr. Goebbel's. He was charged with offenses of all kinds against property to the detriment of the National Socialist Welfare Organization and theft of property of a French national in occupied France. Following a search in the flat of the Gau Office Leader 10524M under a warrant issued by the public prosecutor in Berlin, Dr. Goebbels learned of the investigations and started obstructing these by forbidding party officials to give information to the public prosecutor and by threatening officials of the latter.
Dr. Joel personally took a stand against Dr. Goebbels, carried his point and ordered the arrest of Gau Office Leader Maehler. The proceedings resulted in 4½ years of penal servitude.
The prosecuting authority had presented an affidavit of Ministerialdirigent Suchomel regarding Dr. Joel's activity. (Note 8l). He refers to Dr. Joel as one of the most ruthless section chiefs. Suchomel is right inasmuch as he means Dr. Joel's inflexible action against was profiteers who were protected by the Party. He is wrong, however, if he wants to suggest that Dr. Joel's action was inhuman. During his interrogation on 27 August 1947 (Note 82) he commented on his statement. He cannot maintain such a charge. The prosecuting authority provided me with an opportunity of proving this through their own exhibits (Note 83). During his interrogation on 3 August 1947, (Note 84) Dr. Joel discussed a letter in which the Austrian Gauleiter Ueberreither demanded that the penalty of death be imposed by the Minister of Justice on a farmer who had committed a crime against the war economy.
The defendant Joel refused to be dissuaded from his opinion that only a medium term of penitentiary was called for, which he imparted to his department hear and the minister and effected that the demand of the Gauleiter be refused. The accused was given four years in the penitentiary (Note 85).
The fact, that the defendant Dr. Joel was not the proper person for dealing with matters pertaining to death sentences and, 10524N therefore, cannot know anything about the execution of a sentence for a war economy crime on father and son, was explained by Suchomel in the cross examination (Note 86).3. Removal from the Reich Ministry of Justice In order to be able to assess the value of Joel's activity in the Reich Ministry of Justice correctly, one must bear in mind the opposition of the Party and how this took effect.
The Hamburg justice officials, Landgerichtsdirektor Wentzense and Public Prosecutor K. Stock (Note 87), have given an idea of this and have described individual cases concerning interference of the Party in the Justice system. The sector of the activity of the defendant Joel, which I presented with the aid of the documents presented by the Prosecution, shows that it was a matter of daily task for Dr. Joel to engage in disputes and conflicts with Party officials in all parts of Germany, whenever the local prosecution authorities had reached a deadlock, and that, from the first to the last day of his assignment, he carried out his task in the interest of an orderly administration of justice.
Dr. Joel had a special volume of his personal files, which dealt with complaints by Party officials about his administration of office. This is said not to exist any longer. Many, who know Dr. Joel, substatiate that he was the man the Party hated most in the Reich Ministry of Justice. Here it is only too understandable that those who fought him for years and who finally, with the help of Thierack, removed him upon the latter's accession to office, are not ready today to make official statements concerning this. Such political adversaries have also appeared in this court. I did not follow up these matters, because, without this, I can throw light on his personal difficulties with the Party and the 10524-0 police by examples and on the basis of affidavits made on behalf of Dr. Joel.
Even the first year of his activity, 1933 to 1334, was marked by the most Vehement political attacks on him, because of his especially severe measures against excesses on the part of members of the Party and its affiliations. Hans Gisevius, the witness in the trial of the main war criminals before the IMT, observed Dr. Joel's activity at close quarters up to 1935 and paid tribute to his vigorous behavior.
Until 30.6.34 Stabschef Roehm was in charge of the SA and the SS. Leading circles of the SA saw in the Public Prosecutor Joel, who ruthlessly enforced the laws, the political opponent and had put his name on the list of those who were to be removed by the SA- (Note 88). Dr. Joel, however, did not let himself be deviated by that from his conception of the tasks of the prosecution authority.
During his proceedings against the guards units of the camp "Kemna", the Gauleiter of Duesseldorf made a complaint to the then Prussian Ministerpraesident Goering. He demanded Joel's immediate removal from Office. Before that, the SA leaders and the Gauleiter in charge in Dusseldorf had complained about Dr. Joel to the Under secretary Dr. Freisler (Note 89). They had also criticized Joel's activity most vigorously and unrestrainedly in front of the Public Prosecutor General in Duesseldorf. (Note 90) Minister Guertner protected him, because he had net done anything but his duty.
The events in Munich in 193$, occasioned by the collection, by the Catholic aid organization Caritas, which Joel, after four 10524P weeks of personal investigations, brought before the court for prosecution, led the Gauleiter and the Minister of the Interior of Bavaria to inform the Minister Dr. Guertner, that, in future, Dr. Joel would be prohibited from carrying out his office in Bavaria.
This Gauleiter also at that time demanded Dr. Joel's immediate recall from Munich (Note 91). Minister Guertner declined.
Joel's associate, Public Prosecutor Jakel, describes the intention of Gauleiter Terboven in Essen in 1936 of having Dr. Joel arrested if he should enter his Gau. This incident was a consequence of a proceedings which Joel had initialed against a friend of Terboven, an old Party member, the lord mayor of Essen, for an offense against foreign currency regulations. Dr. Joel sent the Gauleiter a rude reply and continued to visit the Rhine district as before, to create order. (Note 92.)
10524Q (original, page The Chief Public Prosecutor in Bonn impressively described his difficulties with the Party from 1933 to 1934 and stated that ho owed it to Joel's decent attitude and never failing readiness to help, that he succeeded in prosecuting Party proteges and keeping his office.
(Note 93). There were continual complaints by the proper Gauleiter in Cologne against the Chief Public Prosecutor and Dr. Joel.
In the wester part of the Reich the defendant Dr. Joel was known as that official of the Ministry "who took ruthless action against persons protected by the Party". (Note 94), "Herr Joel is playing a dangerous game, which will cause him many enemies in the Party, who would like to see him disappear today rather than tomorrow", the Chief Public Prosecutor in Duesseldorf said (Note 95).
In the southern part of the Reich it was known that Joel came to Munich in order to enforce the interests of the administration of justice in the face of the Gau leadership.
"Joel's attitude towards Party authorities was bound to expose him drastically", states a Munich Public Prosecutor, and continues to say that Joel greatly furthered objective and just decisions (Note 96).
And in the eastern part of the Reich the energetic behavior of the Central Public Prosecution in the face of the Party resulted in that the threat of being reported to them caused even stubborn political leaders to come around. (Note 97). "Dr. Joel was regarded as a man completely independent of the Party, who would not take anything".
Minister Guertner recognized Dr. Joel's merits, (original, page 46) whereas under secretary Freisler lent an ear to the complaints against Joel.
The witness, Attorney Dr. Lenz (Note 98) spoke of Joel's conflicts with Freisler. Public Prosecutor von Haacke testified in a like vein (Note 99), citing an example of those numerous disputes with Dr. Freisler The officials of the penal department again and again witnessed scenes between Dr. Freisler and Dr. Joel.
10524R In 1937, Under Secretary Dr. Freisler believed himself bound to give way to the requests of the Party officials for Dr. Joel's recall, A small clique of officials who had joined the Party before 1933 supported Freisler's intention.
He declared the Central Public Prosecution Authority as dissolved. The reason for his declaration, i.e. that the political situation had calmed down, was not a convincing one (Note 100). As Minister Dr. Guertner told Joel, it was politically more predent, not to contradict this order of Freisler. Dr. Guertner, however, safeguarded Dr. Joel's continued employment as before. This employment was effective until Thierack took office.
Dr, Joel's activity - within the sphere of the Central Public Prosecution Authority - against the arbitrary actions of the Party was successful also owing to his aptitude for including investigation officers of the Berlin policy or officials of the local state police authorities in the criminal prosecutions, since the German public prosecution is dependent on the collaboration of the police in the investigations (Note 101).
Minister Guertner's order dated 19.12.37, whereby Dr. Joel was assigned as liaison official to the policy and the SS, served to maintain that positive cooperation in the interest of the administration of justice. (Note 102).
(original, page 47)
A Ministry official tried to make complaints to the then deputy of the Chief of the Security Police and the SD against Joel, because he "constantly opposed the Party members and therefore the interests of the Party," and would therefore have to bo relieved of the tasks Minister Guertner had delegated to him (Note 103). This serious political attack forced Minister Guertner to authorize a formal investigation through the Manager of the Penal Department, Ministerialdirektor Crohne, It showed the legality of Joel's conduct (Note 104).
10524S Dr. Joel's position of trust with Minister Guertner remained undamaged.
He continued his activity as before. Complaints by the Party continued to reach Minister Guertner, but the award of an SS rank in the SD again strengthened Dr. Joel's position in prosecuting offending members of the Party or its affiliations.
Dr. Joel's behavior after the Anti-Jewish pogrom of the 9 and 10 November 1938 3voked particularly vehement attacks on him. The leadership of the NSDAP and Minister Goebbels had represented the events as a "spontaneous" expression of the will. of the German people. None of the Party officials had thought that the Criminal Justice Administration would deal with the events. And when this happened nevertheless, the right of investigating was granted only to the Party Courts, since it was purely a Party affair. By criminal investigation, the defendant Joel destroyed the fairy-tale of the spontaneous popular indignation.
(original, page 48)
In the files, he named Dr. Goebbels as the instigator, and he succeeded in maintaining the criminal jurisdiction, he succeeded also in getting the Gestapo to cooperate in the criminal proceedings. In a report to Hitler, Goebbel's role and the enormous damage to life and property were stated. All Party circles involved had combined against the defendant Joel - not the least among them, Dr. Goebbels himself. That no measures were taken against the defendant Joel was due to the impossibility of removing, at that juncture, an official who had opposed the universallyknown excesses, and to Dr. Goebbel's personal difficulties because of his relations with a foreign actress.
There had been considerable disputes with Dr. Goebbels in his capacity as Gauleiter of Berlin already during the criminal proceedings against officials of the Gau Administration Berlin because of the unlawful Aryanization of the capital of the Jewish business men, Guggenheim Bros. and of others. When dealing with the criminal pro-
10524T ceedings against the Gau office chief of the NSV, Maehler, I mentioned already that the defendant Joel - notwithstanding his lawful and correct conduct - hadto justify his action before Dr. Goebbels.