After the draft of the law on the treatment of enemies of the society has been completely rewritten, I am sending the enclosed new draft with the consent of the Reich Minister of Justice, Dr. Thierack and ask that the law be approved in a circulatory manner. The necessary number of prints is attached.
The Chief Plenipotentiary for the Reich Administration has again agreed on the importance of the law in war, considering the existing directions for curbing the making of laws and the administrative activity. Furthermore I refer to my letter of 19 March 1942 and to the reasons attached to the draft.
/s/ FrickI have basic objections against the draft of the law. In Par 2, Dir. 4, I assume that the police will inform the penal prosecuting authority also of such cases in which it does not consider-for legal or actual reasons-that a punishable act has been committed or can be proved, especially if it wants to connect the behavior of the culprit with consequences adverse to him. The penal prosecuting authority should be able to determine also in dubious cases whether the possibility of penal prosecution exists. I therefore suggest to formulate Par. 2, Dir. 4, of the law draft about as follows:
"If there is suspicion of a punishable act by enemies of society, the police will inform the penal prosecuting authorities about it."
Because, in the framework of the draft, the basic regulation of the connections between penal justice and police has become mandatory, an exact definition of the respective competence seems necessary to me. In the expected executory decree it should hence be made clear, as it was already provided in the draft of the executory decree (Par. 4) for the first draft of the law, that police actions because of the same matter are not admissible anymore if a court has freed (a party) because of proven innocence or lack of proofs, except for custody measures in case of freeing for lack of proofs. Furthermore, it should be determined that the police can not take other than custody measures after the penal term of a person judged by a court because of the same facts. Further, I think it necessary to have a fundamental clearing of the question whether, and if so-to what degree police measures are admissible after refusal of a decree of custody or other judicial directions, regardless of the reason for refusal.
Finally, I mention for consideration if the words "the regime of the time of the system" in Dir. 3 of the official document, taken from the newspaper language, could not be replaced to advantage by another expression.
I especially direct your attention to the printing mistake in the last but two dir. of the reason, in which in the third line it should probably read "protective surveillance" instead of "protective custody".
Rosenberg|
Source: Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression Volume IV Office of the United States Chief Counsel for Prosecution of Axis Criminality Washington, DC : United States Government Printing Office, 1946 |