The Indictment

The four chief prosecutors of the International Military Tribunal (IMT)–Robert H. Jackson (United States), Francois de Menthon (France), Roman A. Rudenko (Soviet Union), and Sir Hartley Shawcross (Great Britain)–handed down indictments against 24 Nazi officials, and named 6 organizations or groups as criminal. The indictment was first filed on October 18, 1945, in Berlin, and was read on the first day of the trial, November 20, 1945. Only 21 defendants appeared in court. German industrialist Gustav Krupp was included in the original indictment, but he was elderly and in failing health. It was decided in preliminary hearings to exclude him from the proceedings. Nazi Party secretary Martin Bormann was tried and convicted in absentia. Robert Ley committed suicide on the eve of the trial.

Produced by US Army Signal Corps 1945-1956, housed in National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). Digitized and provided by The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum; Steven Spielberg Film and Video Archive.

The Four Counts

  1. The Common Plan or conspiracy
  2. Crimes Against Peace
  3. War Crimes
  4. Crimes Against Humanity

For the full text of the Indictment visit The Avalon Project.

The individuals named in the Indictment:

Hermann Göring (Hitler’s heir designate, Reichsmarschal)
Rudolf Hess (Deputy Leader of the Nazi Party)
Joachim von Ribbentrop (Foreign Minister)
Wilhelm Keitel (Chief of Staff of the German High Command)
Wilhelm Frick (Minister of the Interior)
Ernst Kaltenbrunner (Head of Reich Main Security Office)
Hans Frank (Governor-General of occupied Poland)
Baron Konstantin von Neurath (Governor of Bohemia and Moravia)
Erich Raeder (Head of the Navy)
Karl Dönitz (Raeder’s successor)
Alfred Jodl (Chief of Operations for the German High Command)
Alfred Rosenberg (Minister for the Eastern Occupied Territories)
Baldur von Schirach (Head of the Hitler Youth)
Julius Streicher (radical Nazi antisemitic publisher)
Fritz Sauckel (Plenipotentiary of the Nazi slave labor program)
Albert Speer (Minister of Armaments)
Arthur Seyss-Inquart (Commissioner for the Occupied Netherlands)
Martin Bormann (Hitler’s adjutant)
Hans Fritzsche (Head of News Division of the Nazi Propaganda Ministry)
Walther Funk (Minister of Economics)
Franz von Papen (Vice-Chancellor)
Hjalmar Schacht (Reichsbank President)
Robert Ley (Head of the German Labor Party)
Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach (Chairman of the Reich Association of German Industry)

The organizations named in the Indictment:

Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party
SS (Schutzstaffel – Protective Echelon)
SD (Sicherheitsdienst – Security Service)
Gestapo (Secret Police)
SA (Sturmabteilung – Storm Detachment)
Staff & High Command of the German Armed Forces

On October 18, 1945, the indictment against 24 leading Nazi war criminals was filed at the first public session of the International Military Tribunal. The Indictment was read again on the first day of the trial, November 20, 1945.

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