Hostages Trial

The United States of America v. Wilhelm List, et al., commonly known as the Hostages Trial, was the seventh of the twelve "Subsequent Nuremberg trials" for war crimes and crimes against humanity after the end of World War II between 1947 and 1948. The accused were 12 Wehrmacht generals of the Balkan Campaign charged with ordering the hostage-taking of civilians, wanton shootings of these hostages, the reprisal killings of civilians, and the execution without trial of captured "partisans" (both real and suspected) perpetrated by German troops in occupied Greece, Albania and Yugoslavia. Defendant Lothar Rendulic was further charged for using scorched earth in Finland during the Lapland War in 1944. The Hostages Trial was held by United States authorities at the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg in the American occupation zone before US military courts, not before the International Military Tribunal. Two were found guilty of 3 counts, four of 2 counts, and two of 1 count, receiving prison sentences ranging from seven years to life imprisonment, and four were acquitted of all charges. Franz Böhme committed suicide before the arraignment, and Maximilian von Weichs was severed from the trial for medical reasons. The judges in this case, heard before Military Tribunal V, were Charles F. Wennerstrum (presiding judge) from Iowa, George J. Burke from Michigan, and Edward F. Carter from Nebraska. The Chief of Counsel for the Prosecution was Telford Taylor, the chief prosecutor for this case was Theodore Fenstermacher. The indictment was filed on May 10, 1947; the trial lasted from July 8, 1947, until February 19, 1948.