People's Court (Germany) - Notable People Sentenced To Death By The Volksgerichtshof

Notable People Sentenced To Death By The Volksgerichtshof

• 1942 – Helmuth Hübener. At the age of 17, he was the youngest opponent of the Third Reich executed as a result of a trial by the Volksgerichtshof.
• 1943 – Otto and Elise Hampel. The couple carried out civil disobedience in Berlin, were caught, tried, sentenced to death by Freisler, and executed. Their story formed the basis for the 1947 Hans Fallada novel Every Man Dies Alone.
• 1943 – Members of the White Rose resistance movement: Sophie Scholl, Hans Scholl, Alex Schmorell, Willi Graf, Christoph Probst, and Kurt Huber.
• 1943 – Julius Fučík. A Czechoslovakian journalist, Communist Party of Czechoslovakia leader, and a leader in the forefront of the anti-Nazi resistance. On August 25, 1943, in Berlin, he was accused of high treason in connection with his political activities. He was found guilty and beheaded two weeks later on September 8, 1943.
• 1943 – Karlrobert Kreiten. A German pianist. Nazi Ellen Ott-Monecke notified the Gestapo of Kreiten's negative remarks about Adolf Hitler and the war effort. Kreiten was indicted at the Volksgerichtshof, with Freisler presiding, and condemned to death. Friends and family frantically tried to save his life to no avail. The family was never notified officially about the judgment. They only accidentally learned that Kreiten had been executed with 185 other inmates in Plötzensee Prison.
• 1944 – Max Josef Metzger. A German Catholic priest. Metzger was the founder in 1938 of the "Una Sancta Brotherhood," an ecumenical movement for bringing Catholics and Protestants to unity. During the trial Freisler said that people (meaning clergy) like Metzger should be "eradicated."
• 1944 – Erwin von Witzleben. A German Field Marshal (Generalfeldmarschall). Witzleben was a German Army (Wehrmacht) conspirator in the July 20 Bomb Plot to kill Hitler. Witzleben, who would have been Commander-in-Chief of the Wehrmacht in the planned post-coup government, arrived at Army Headquarters (OKH-HQ) in Berlin on July 20 to assume command of the coup forces. He was arrested the next day and tried by the People's Court on August 8. Witzleben was sentenced to death and hanged the same day in Plötzensee Prison.
• 1944 – Johanna "Hanna" Kirchner. A member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands, SPD).
• 1944 – Lieutenant-Colonel Caesar von Hofacker. A member of a resistance group in Nazi Germany. Hofacker's goal was to overthrow Hitler.
• 1944 – Carl Friedrich Goerdeler – Conservative German politician, economist, civil servant and opponent of the Nazi regime, who would have served as the Chancellor of the new government had the 20 July plot of 1944 succeeded.
• 1944 – Otto Kiep – the Chief of the Reich Press Office (Reichspresseamts), which became involved in resistance.
• 1944 – Elisabeth von Thadden, as well as other members of anti-Nazi Solf Circle.
• 1944 – Julius Leber – German politician of the SPD and a member of the German Resistance against the Nazi régime.
• 1944 – Johannes Popitz – Prussian finance minister and a member of the German Resistance against Nazi Germany.
• 1945 – Helmuth James Graf von Moltke – German jurist, a member of the opposition against Adolf Hitler in Nazi Germany, and a founding member of the Kreisau Circle resistance group.
• 1945 – Klaus Bonhoeffer and Rüdiger Schleicher – German resistance fighters.
• 1945 – Erwin Planck. Politician, businessman, resistance fighter and son of physicist Max Planck. Planck was an alleged conspirator in the July 20 plot.
• 1945 – Artur Nebe. An SS-General (Gruppenführer). Nebe was a conspirator in the July 20 Bomb Plot to kill Hitler. He was the head of the Kriminalpolizei, or Kripo, and the commander of Einsatzgruppe B. Nebe oversaw massacres on the Russian Front, and at other locations as he was commanded to do by his superiors in the SS. After the failure to assassinate Hitler, Nebe hid on an island in the Wannsee until he was betrayed by one of his mistresses. On March 21, 1945, Nebe was hanged, allegedly with piano wire (Hitler wanted members of the plot "hanged like cattle") at Plötzensee Prison.