Josef Dietrich

Hans Frank was given the order to put all captured SA officers in the prison to death. He objected to the executions with out paperwork. Sepp Dietrich put Frank on the phone with Hess and Hitler who quickly persuaded him otherwise.

Dietrich proceeded to walk the through the prison doors telling each of the SA officers that Hitler had declared them traitors and they were to be executed. The were walked out one by one where they were killed by firing squad. They knew many of these people and knew they were at least innocent of the made up charges of high treason but they carried out the killings all the same. Murdered in this manor were:

Edmund Heines
August Schneidhuber
-more to come

Dietrich was held as a prisoner of war after being captured by American forces. He was later transferred to Nuremberg to be called as a witness against other Nazis.

Dietrich was never called as a witness at the Nuremberg trials. After the decided against using him in the trial they sent him to Dachau with other top SS officers to await trial.

After being released after serving ten years of a life sentence Dietrich was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to eighteen months along with Michael Lippert. Dietrich only served six months of the sentence.

Trial for the murders of American prisoner of war.

- Sepp Dietrich was sentenced to life imprisonment at Landsberg prison.

With many others Dietrich was sentenced to life imprisonment, but he only ended up serving just ten years. He was able to appeal and get his conviction reduced.

The postwar government of Germany was not happy about the early release of Dietrich. So they decided to arrest the pair and put them on trial for the murders they helped commit the weekend of operation Hummingbird.