"The defendants in the dock were the cruel executioners, whose terror wrote the blackest page in human history. Death was their tool and life their toy. If these men be immune, then law has lost its meaning and man must live in fear."
Benjamin Berell Ferencz (11 March 1920 - 7 April 2023) had a truly remarkable life. He was the last surviving prosecutor of the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials.
His childhood days were as a poor immigrant in America during the Great Depression. He won a scholarship to Harvard, landed on the Normandy beaches on D Day, and was present at the liberation of some of the concentration camps including Buchenwald and Mauthausen.
From 29 September 1947 to 9 April 1948, at the age of 27, he prosecuted members of the Einsatzgruppen charged with the murder and ill-treatment of Prisoners of War and Civilians in occupied countries. Originally there were 24 defendants but Emil Hausmann committed suicide and Otto Rasch was deemed too ill to stand trial. The remaining 22 defendants were all convicted on one or more charge.
The Einsatzgruppen
were mobile killing squads charged with the extermination of those chillingly referred to as "undesirables". From 1941, the Einsatzgruppen murdered more than one million people. The units usually operated behind the army, moving from place to place killing and disposing of bodies.14 defendants were sentenced to death but 10 had their sentences commuted to imprisonment. The remaining 4 were Otto Ohlendorf, Erich Naumann, Paul Blobel, Werner Braune and they were hanged at Landesburg prison on 7 June 1951. (Oswald Pohl, convicted at a different trial, was also hanged on the same day).
In later life, Ferencz was a lawyer for Holocaust survivors, a law teacher, a writer, a lecturer around the world, a lobbyist for and builder of international legal institutions, a force for world progress toward peace through law, and a moral exemplar to millions.
In particular, Ferencz fought for the establishment of the international criminal court and was the author of several books - Books | Benjamin B. Ferencz - including:
and
Parting Words: 10 Lessons for a Remarkable Life | Benjamin B. Ferencz (benferencz.org).
Reading:
Obituaries
Benjamin B. Ferencz (1920 – 2023) – The Jackson List
Ben Ferencz, the last living Nuremberg prosecutor of Nazis, has died at 103
Ben Ferencz: D-Day vet, Nuremberg prosecutor, ICC visionary
Ben Ferencz, the last living Nuremberg trials prosecutor, dies aged 103 (thejournal.ie)
The trial
The Nuremberg Trials:The Einsatzgruppen Case (famous-trials.com)
The Einsatzgruppen
The Einsatzgruppen (alphahistory.com)T
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