August Franz Frank (5 April 189821 March 1984) was a German SS functionary in the

SS Main Economic and Administrative Office The SS Main Economic and Administrative Office (; SS-WVHA) was a Nazi organization responsible for managing the finances, supply systems and business projects of the (a main branch of the ; SS). It also ran the concentration camps and was instru ...

, generally known by its German initials WVHA. The WVHA was, among other things, responsible for the administration of the

Nazi concentration camps From 1933 to 1945, Nazi Germany operated more than a thousand concentration camps (), including subcamp (SS), subcamps on its own territory and in parts of German-occupied Europe. The first camps were established in March 1933 immediately af ...

. After the war, the higher WVHA officials, including Frank, were tried and convicted of

crimes against humanity Crimes against humanity are certain serious crimes committed as part of a large-scale attack against civilians. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity can be committed during both peace and war and against a state's own nationals as well as ...

Early Nazi career

Frank joined the SS as a private on 1 May 1932, and the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party ( or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor ...

on 1 January 1933. From 1933 to 1935, Frank worked at minor administrative duties in connection with a number of small industries at the

Dachau concentration camp Dachau (, ; , ; ) was one of the first concentration camps built by Nazi Germany and the longest-running one, opening on 22 March 1933. The camp was initially intended to intern Hitler's political opponents, which consisted of communists, s ...

manned by inmate labor, most of which were concerned with concentration camp maintenance.

Rise in Nazi hierarchy

In 1935, at the request of

Oswald Pohl Oswald Ludwig Pohl (; 30 June 1892 – 7 June 1951) was a German high-ranking SS official during the Nazi era. As the head of the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office and the head administrator of the Nazi concentration camps, he was a ke ...

, Frank became SS Administrative Officer of the Special Purpose Troops (''

SS-Verfügungstruppe (SS-VT, ) was formed in 1934 as combat troops for the Nazi Party (NSDAP). On 17 August 1938 Adolf Hitler decreed that the SS-VT was neither a part of the (order police) nor the , but military-trained men at the disposal of the . In time of wa ...

'') and of the concentration camp guards, the SS Death's Head units (''

SS-Totenkopfverbände (SS-TV; or 'SS Death's Head Battalions') was a major branch of the Nazi Party's paramilitary (SS) organisation. It was responsible for administering the Nazi concentration camps, concentration camps and extermination camps of Nazi Germany ...

''), although the presence of a bureaucratic rival somewhat limited his authority in the second capacity. In February 1940, Frank became chief supply officer of the

Waffen-SS The (; ) was the military branch, combat branch of the Nazi Party's paramilitary ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) organisation. Its formations included men from Nazi Germany, along with Waffen-SS foreign volunteers and conscripts, volunteers and conscr ...

and Death's Head units under Pohl.

Concentration camp administrator

When the WVHA was organized in 1942, he became Pohl's deputy chief of WVHA and chief of Department (''Amtsgruppe'') A, the administrative division of WVHA. He served in this capacity until 1 September 1943, when he was permitted to resign to become administrative chief of the

Order Police The ''Ordnungspolizei'' (''Orpo'', , meaning "Order Police") were the uniformed police force in Nazi Germany from 1936 to 1945. The Orpo was absorbed into the Nazi monopoly of power after regional police jurisdiction was removed in favour of t ...

. Amtsgruppe A was the administrative branch of WVHA. It comprised five offices (''Ämter''), as follows: * Amt A-1: budgets. * Amt A-2: finance and payroll. * Amt A-3: legal matters. * Amt A-4: auditing office. * Amt A-5: personnel.

Involvement in the Holocaust

A measure of the detailed planning that Frank and other Nazis put into the carrying out of the Holocaust and the deprivation of the property of the murdered Jews can be gauged from a memorandum prepared by Frank on 26 September 1942. For example, Frank gave instructions on dealing with the underwear of the murder victims. This memorandum, when it came to light after the war, played a key role in refuting Frank's claims that he had no knowledge that Jews were being murdered en masse in the extermination camps of

Operation Reinhard Operation Reinhard or Operation Reinhardt ( or ; also or ) was the codename of the secret Nazi Germany, German plan in World War II to exterminate History of the Jews in Poland, Polish Jews in the General Government district of German-occupied ...

. The memorandum is also notable as an example of the use of the Nazi euphemism "evacuation" of the Jews, which meant their systematic murder.

Crimes against humanity

After World War II, Frank was placed on

trial In law, a trial is a coming together of parties to a dispute, to present information (in the form of evidence) in a tribunal, a formal setting with the authority to adjudicate claims or disputes. One form of tribunal is a court. The tribunal, w ...

on accusations that during his work at WVHA he had committed

. The court concerned itself with Frank's conduct between 1 September 1939, and 1 September 1943. Frank's defense was that he thought the only people in concentration camps were solely composed of German nationals who were either habitual criminals or genuine threats to the Nazi regime. This argument was rejected by the court, which found that Frank knew of and actively participated in the Nazi slave labor program. The court held that the following evidence, among other things, showed Frank's knowledge of the international slave labor program that the Nazi concentration camps had become: * A letter from

, dated 26 June 1942, to all Amtsgruppen chiefs (which would have included Frank), stating that the head of every branch office which was provided with prisoners or prisoners of war for work was responsible for the prevention of escape, robbery, and sabotage; * A letter signed by Oswald Pohl, but actually dictated by Frank, to

Heinrich Himmler Heinrich Luitpold Himmler (; 7 October 1900 – 23 May 1945) was a German Nazism, Nazi politician and military leader who was the 4th of the (Protection Squadron; SS), a leading member of the Nazi Party, and one of the most powerful p ...

, which discussed the commanders of many of the concentration camps and their qualifications and recommendations for reassignments, detachments, and promotions. * Frank's memorandum of 26 September 1942 to SS administrators at Lublin and Auschwitz directing that the

Jewish Star The Star of David (, , ) is a symbol generally recognized as representing both Jewish identity and Judaism. Its shape is that of a hexagram: the compound of two equilateral triangles. A derivation of the Seal of Solomon was used for decora ...

be removed from the garments of deceased inmates. Frank appears to have planned to personally profit from concentration camp labor. He was an incorporating partner with

Georg Lörner Georg Nikolaus Lörner (18 February 1899 – 21 April 1959) was a German SS functionary during the Nazi era. He served as Deputy Chief under Oswald Pohl, of the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office. Lörner was in charge of maintaining the ...

, another WVHA official, in a leather and textile enterprise at Dachau. Based on this and other evidence, the court rejected Frank's testimony as incredible:

Involvement in genocide

Frank's lawyer claimed Frank "did not work for the political aims of National Socialism." This position was rejected by the court: In particular, Frank at his trial claimed he only became aware of the Jewish extermination program after hearing Himmler's Posen speech on 4 October 1943, a month after he had left the WVHA. By this time, the Nazis had nearly completed the mass killings of the Jews of Poland and nearby areas of Eastern Europe in what has become known as Action Reinhard, also known as Operation Reinhard and the Reinhard action. Frank handled the huge amount of personal property that was either robbed from the Jews while they were alive or stolen from their bodies (there were 2,000 car loads of textiles, for instance). In his 26 September 1942 memorandum, Frank had chosen to designate this property as "Jewish concealed and stolen goods." The court rejected Frank's claim that he couldn't have known of the source of these goods: Frank claimed that he didn't know and had no reason to know that the people from whom the property had come from had been murdered en masse; he testified that he thought all the property accumulating from Operation Reinhard had come from Jews who had died naturally in concentration camps. The court rejected this contention, relying again on the categories of property Frank had dealt with in his 26 September 1942 memorandum :

Acquitted of mass murder

Although the court had ruled that Frank was criminally answerable for the slave labor program and the looting of Jewish property, he escaped criminal liability for the murders themselves, as the court viewed him as generally being only involved after the people had already been murdered.

Member of criminal organization (Nazi SS)

Frank was found guilty also of being a member of a criminal organization, that is, the

Nazi SS The ''Schutzstaffel'' (; ; SS; also stylised with SS runes as ''ᛋᛋ'') was a major paramilitary organisation under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany, and later throughout German-occupied Europe during World War II. It bega ...

. Frank's highest rank in the SS was Lieutenant General (''

Obergruppenführer (, ) was a paramilitary rank in Nazi Germany that was first created in 1932 as a rank of the ''Sturmabteilung'' (SA) and adopted by the ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) one year later. Until April 1942, it was the highest commissioned SS rank after ...

'').

Sentence and commutation

On 3 November 1947 Frank was sentenced to life in prison by the tribunal with the following words: In 1951 Frank's sentence was commuted to 15 years. He was released from prison on 6 May 1954, and died in March 1984.