Trials of war criminals before the Nuernberg military tribunals under control council law no. 10, volume IIVarious
Philosophy
Trials of war criminals before the Nuernberg military tribunals under control council law no. 10, volume II
Various
Nuremberg Trial of Major German War Criminals, Nuremberg, Germany, 1945-1946; War crime trials -- Germany -- Nuremberg
10. During the course of the experiment the scientist in charge must be
prepared to terminate the experiment at any stage, if he has probably
cause to believe, in the exercise of the good faith, superior skill and
careful judgment required of him that a continuation of the experiment
is likely to result in injury, disability, or death to the experimental
subject.
Of the ten principles which have been enumerated our judicial concern,
of course, is with those requirements which are purely legal in
nature—or which at least are so clearly related to matters legal that
they assist us in determining criminal culpability and punishment. To go
beyond that point would lead us into a field that would be beyond our
sphere of competence. However, the point need not be labored. We find
from the evidence that in the medical experiments which have been
proved, these ten principles were much more frequently honored in their
breach than in their observance. Many of the concentration camp inmates
who were the victims of these atrocities were citizens of countries
other than the German Reich. They were non-German nationals, including
Jews and “asocial persons”, both prisoners of war and civilians, who had
been imprisoned and forced to submit to these tortures and barbarities
without so much as a semblance of trial. In every single instance
appearing in the record, subjects were used who did not consent to the
experiments; indeed, as to some of the experiments, it is not even
contended by the defendants that the subjects occupied the status of
volunteers. In no case was the experimental subject at liberty of his
own free choice to withdraw from any experiment. In many cases
experiments were performed by unqualified persons; were conducted at
random for no adequate scientific reason, and under revolting physical
conditions. All of the experiments were conducted with unnecessary
suffering and injury and but very little, if any, precautions were taken
to protect or safeguard the human subjects from the possibilities of
injury, disability, or death. In every one of the experiments the
subjects experienced extreme pain or torture, and in most of them they
suffered permanent injury, mutilation, or death, either as a direct
result of the experiments or because of lack of adequate follow-up care.
Obviously all of these experiments involving brutalities, tortures,
disabling injury, and death were performed in complete disregard of
international conventions, the laws and customs of war, the general
principles of criminal law as derived from the criminal laws of all
civilized nations, and Control Council Law No. 10. Manifestly human
experiments under such conditions are contrary to “the principles of the
law of nations as they result from the usages established among
civilized peoples, from the laws of humanity, and from the dictates of
public conscience.”
Whether any of the defendants in the dock are guilty of these atrocities
is, of course, another question.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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