Documents will prove that the defendant von Ammon always showed a tendency towards leniency, considering the prevailing circumstances and the extent of his competence. This will also be clearly in keeping with the whole personality of the defendant. We shall find him an official who entered the ministerial career solely on the strength of his expert knowledge immediately after he passed his legal examination with special distinction, the type of man with a sense of duty who lives only for his work. Von Ammon was not an active National Socialist, this is confirmed by his entering the Party only in 1937, comparatively late for a ministerial official. I shall produce testimonials characterizing the defendant as a deeply humane and strictly religious man. I feel also that the trial will enable the Tribunal to form their own impression in this respect. In these circumstances it will have to be examined all the more carefully whether the evidence shows that this man is guilty of a crime against humanity irreconcilable with his character. H. Opening Statement for Defendant Rothaug[80] DR. KOESSL: May it please the Tribunal. If I correctly understand the unuttered yet cogent logic of the charges listed in the indictment, the effect and example of that legal system to which the prosecution tries to attach the stigma of a criminal government institution begins with the Rothaug case. The evidence against him, out of proportion considering the entire framework of the indictment is in contrast to his mere functional position, based on his activities as judge and prosecutor. Although I am aware of the fact that such purely external disproportion between the importance of the matter on the one hand and the deployment of means on the other hand, as seen from a higher point of view, may cause a shifting of the focus in the eyes of a superficial observer, I am however certain that the desire for a true and just sentence will prevent the overlooking of the limitations and degrees of responsibility. Yet the direction of the main thrust of the prosecution has become rather clearly discernible by the few submitted documents, out of thousands of files. We face it with a clear conscience, calm and courageously, for documents do not lie. What distresses us is the evidence submitted in order to impress and otherwise help the main thrust, evidence which has been available in accessible localities and without difficulties, with incriminating tendencies, sometimes even willfully incriminating, and which has offered in hundreds of variations and superlatives an almost unfathomable jungle of assertions, estimates, and opinions. The mobilization of this evidence compels us to handle the most enervating and tedious detail for truth’s sake.