Pre-death legacy Hans Fertig

In 2013, the lawyer Hans Fertig (1929-2015) transferred his written pre-death legacy with extensive records regarding his occupation as a counsel at several proceedings regarding Nazi violent crimes (NSG-Verfahren) from the 1960s to the 1980s to the Fritz Bauer Institute. Hans Fertig was born on February 4, 1929 in Amorbach in the Forest of Odes where he passed his Abitur in 1949. He then studied law in Würzburg. In 1959, he passed his first state examination (Referendarexamen) and in 1963 his second state examination (Assessorexamen). During his preparatory service, he earned his doctorate in higher education law and published articles in relevant legal journals. In 1963, he became the editor of the Neue Juristische Wochenschrift. At the same time, he established himself as a lawyer in Frankfurt (Main) and took over mandates of all legal spheres, especially of civil law. In the early 1960s, Fertig learned about the preparations of the First Frankfurt Auschwitz trial from the press and casually discussed it with the trial's future chief judge, Hans Hofmeyer. At Hofmeyer's suggestion, Fertig took over the second mandates of the defendants Bruno Schlage, Arthur Breitwieser and Josef Klehr. Following this, Fertig participated in about a dozen proceedings regarding Nazi violent crimes (NSG-Verfahren) as a defense lawyer. For example, he advocated for the former SS-Sturmbannführer Kuno Callsen at the Darmstadt Callsen trial or for Horst Czerwinski and Josef Schmidt at the Sixth Frankfurt Auschwitz trial. Hans Fertig died on March 23, 2015 at age 86 in Frankfurt (Main). The pre-death legacy Hans Fertig contains after description, demetallization and filing 271 archival units with a total extent of 8.0 running meters. It was loosely organized, upon the acquisition in 2013, according to the eleven proceedings regarding Nazi violent crimes (NSG-Verfahren) in which Fertig participated. Immediately after the acquisition, the holding was provisionally and cursorily described in the form of an excel spreadsheet. During indexing in 2018, the processor Johannes Beermann-Schön adopted the original structure but subdivided it further and corrected some wrong classifications of archival units. The holding is now structured along the eleven proceedings which in turn are subdivided into seven sections: "documents regarding trial preparations" ("Dokumente betr. die Prozessvorbereitung"), "documents regarding the main proceedings" ("Dokumente betr. das Hauptverfahren"), "documents regarding detention conditions, parole, appeal proceedings and clemency appeals" ("Dokumente betr. Haftbedingungen, Haftaussetzung, Revisionsverfahren und Gnadengesuche"), "press coverage" ("Presseberichterstattung"), "documents regarding remuneration" ("Dokumente betr. Vergütung") and "other matters" ("Sonstiges"). The section "documents regarding the main proceedings" ("Dokumente betr. das Hauptverfahren") is further subdivided into the categories "process sequence" ("Prozessverlauf"), "claims and statements" ("Anträge und Stellungnahmen"), "correspondence" ("Korrespondenz"), "evidentiary hearing" ("Beweisaufnahme"), "pleading" ("Plädoyer") and "verdict" ("Urteil"). The pre-death legacy Hans Fertig covers records concerning eleven different proceedings regarding Nazi violent crimes (NSG-Verfahren) in which Fertig participated as the defense attorney of at least one defendant. In the First Frankfurt Auschwitz trial (1963-1965), Hans Fertig represented the defendants Breitwieser, Schlage, and Klehr, who were charged for crimes committed at Auschwitz concentration and extermination camp. One year later, the so called Kolomea trial (1966-1967) began in Darmstadt. Originally, eight members of the Einsatzgruppe C were charged for mass shootings and deportations in the West Ukrainian town Kolomea and its environs. Fertig served as the defense counsel for one of the defendants. In the same year, members of the Sonderkommando 4a of the Einsatzgruppe C, who had killed tens of thousands of people in the Ukraine in 1941, stood trial at the so called Callsen trial (1967-1968) also in Darmstadt. Hans Fertig served as the defense counsel for Kuno Callsen, the main defendant, who had instructed the mass shooting in Babyn Yar in the end of September 1941 as SS-Hauptsturmführer. In the years 1968 to 1971, Fertig advocated for a former policeman who was accused by the Landgericht Darmstadt of having shot or ordered the shooting of Jews during the eviction of the Kielce ghetto in south Poland in August 1942. Simultaneously, between 1970 and 1973, a criminal case was heard at the Landgericht Wiesbaden regarding shootings in Lublin and Zamosc, as well as deportations to Belzec extermination camp. Hans Fertig served as the defense counsel for a defendant who was accused of instructing a mass shooting of 780 Soviet prisoners of war in 1941 in a forest near Zamosc. Another defendant was absent from the trial due to illness. A separate criminal case was initiated against him by the Landgericht Wiesbaden between 1973 and 1975 and Fertig also served as his defense. The commercial agent was accused of being involved in the deportation of thousands of Jews from the ghetto in Lublin to Belzec extermination camp. In the years 1971 and 1972, Fertig was the criminal defense lawyer in a trial against former members of the Sicherheitspolizei in the Polish town Tomaszów Mazowiecki. The three defendants were accused of having conducted a shooting in the Tomaszów Mazowiecki ghetto in 1942. Another trial also revolved around mass shootings: the trial against several members of the police battalion 306 at the Landgericht Frankfurt (Main) from 1971 to 1973. The police battalion 306 was responsible for the shooting of 5,000 Soviet prisoners of war in the forest of Huisinka near Biala Podlaska close to Lublin, and for the shooting of a total of 20,000 Jews during the liquidation of the ghettos in Pinsk and five other places in that region. Fertig advocated for the Gebietskommissar of Pinsk who later was suspended from the trial. For more than ten years, Hans Fertig was concerned with the trials against Josef Schmidt and Horst Czerwinski at the Landgericht Frankfurt (Main) (1977-1981) and at the Landgericht Lüneburg (1985-1989). As SS-Unterscharführer, Czerwinski oversaw the Auschwitz satellite camp Golleschau at least since 1944 and shortly after the Auschwitz satellite camp Lagischa. At the same time, Schmidt was block leader at the labor camp Lagischa. In the Sixth Frankfurt Auschwitz trial, Schmidt was sentenced to eight years of youth custody in 1981. Czerwinski on the other hand was suspended from the trial due to illness. But six years later the Landgericht Lüneburg put him on trial again and Fertig defended him again.