Nuremberg Trials
The Nuremberg Trials were the first instance of anybody in history being tried by an international court for crimes that took place on an international scale. The Trials’ are named after the city they took place in, and were held from November 20, 1945 to October 1, 1946. The trials were the express wish of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, as recorded at the Yalta Conference. Stalin was originally opposed to the use of any judicial process, preferring summary execution, but Roosevelt and Churchill eventually obtained his agreement. Defendants in the trials were the leaders of the Third Reich, not including Adolf Hitler, who had committed suicide. The trials were the first held by the International Criminal Court (ICC). The defendants were all charged with one or some combination of 4 basic charges: participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace, planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace, war crimes, or crimes against humanity. Although the trials were conducted as military tribunals and rules for how the trials would be conducted were laid out in the Tehran, Yalta, and Potsdam Conferences, the inaugural nature of the trials meant that the guidelines were general and would require adaptation as problems arose. The ICC was based on elements taken from the legal systems of the various Allied countries, with the American justice system being more heavily represented than the rest. Approximately 200 defendants were tried, all of whom were given competency tests prior to the trials. All the defendants were found fit to stand trial. The defendants were each provided with defense council, the vast majority of which was made up of German attorneys. The Trials were judged by a tribunal made up of four representatives, each one representing the United States, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, or France. A single alternate was also provided by each country. Several of the judges were high ranking military officers, with the notable exception of the United States’ judge, who was the attorney general at the time. Four lead prosecutors were provided by the same countries, including the United States’ Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson. France was allowed to be represented on the tribunal and the prosecution team despite the fact that France originally allied itself with Germany. Of 24 defendants charged with the most severe crimes, 19 were convicted. Of those 19 convicted, 11 were sentenced to death. Of the remaining 8 convicted defendants, 5 were sentenced to lengthy prison terms, and 3 were sentenced to life imprisonment.