As regards the participation of the defendant von Ammon in this department which has been allocated to him in the course of the allocation of duties in the Ministry, the following will be dealt with: von Ammon’s position as an expert, who was subordinated to the subsection chief, Ministerialdirigent Mettgenberg; section chief at first Ministerialdirektor Crohne, later Ministerialdirektor Vollmer; Under Secretary, at first, Freisler and later Klemm; and lastly the Minister himself. If, therefore, von Ammon only ranked fifth in seniority, then this fact determines also his authority to sign and his actual responsibility. All important matters required the signature of, at least, the subsection chief, in most cases that of the section chief. We therefore find that none of the letters from the Reich Ministry to another office, which have been submitted by the prosecution, were signed by von Ammon. I shall prove that von Ammon did not participate in drawing up the basic legal regulations. Thus, the legal argument arises whether a person who has merely to carry out administrative tasks without thereby causing a wrong to be done in the sense of sufficient causality by this activity itself, bears a criminal responsibility for this. I shall describe how the NN proceedings were carried out and shall show that no special regulations were issued restricting the proper trial beyond the secrecy decreed by law. As can be seen from the circular of 6 March 1943, Document NG-269, Prosecution Exhibit 319[79] submitted by the prosecution, care was taken that the prisoners did not forego their otherwise customary rights, as long as the purpose of this secrecy was not endangered. I shall disprove the view of the prosecution that persons who had obviously not committed any act of resistance, were treated in the same way as guilty NN prisoners. I shall explain that, on principle, the Wehrmacht authorities in the occupied territories handed over only such cases to the legal authorities in Germany where the evidence was materially complete, as the witness Lehmann testified earlier. It will be proved that even where the innocence of the prisoner was established only in Germany, there was the possibility of being released to the occupied territories. Evidence will be produced from the proceedings of the courts that the NN trials were in no way conducted differently from other trials, except for the restrictions for reasons of secrecy. It will particularly be shown that the difficulties in procuring evidence from the occupied territories favored the defendant insofar as he was protected by the principle of _in dubio pro reo_, i. e., the defendant had to be acquitted in case of doubt where the evidence in support of the indictment was incomplete. I shall endeavor to give a summary of the sentences given in actual practice. In regard to the handing over of NN prisoners to the police, no responsibility can be attached to the defendant von Ammon for participation.