On this day in 1947, The Justice Trial began.Six months after Germany surrendered in World War II, the United States, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and the French Republic all signed the Nuremberg Charter to bring the Nazis to justice. This was the result of a declaration by the Allied Powers that they intended to punish Nazi war criminals. This charter declared that all German war criminals would be prosecuted for their war crimes in the country in which they occurred. Those who committed war crimes in more than one country, deeming them major war criminals, would be tried by the International Military Tribunal (IMT). The IMT was made up of a judge, an alternate judge, and a prosecution team from each of the four participating countries. The first IMT trial was held at the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg, Germany from November 20, 1945, until October 1, 1946. 24 defendants, all involved in economic, political, or military Nazi leadership, were indicted, though only 21 defendants appeared in court. The Holocaust was not the primary subject of the trial, but evidence of the Final Solution, concentration and death camps, as well as the deaths of six million Jews, was presented. In the end, 19 of the 24 defendants were found guilty. What followed the first IMT trial was a series of subsequent Nuremberg proceedings, as well as trials in Germany with its former allies of hundreds of Nazi perpetrators. The proceedings were for Nazi war criminals, led through 12 trials by the United States military tribunals also in Germany. On February 13, 1947, the United States created the Military Tribunal III, the third of 12 subsequent Nuremberg proceedings. Known as the Justice, or The Judges’, Trial, it was focused on German judges and prosecutors of the Reich Ministry of Justice or the People's and Special Courts. Like the IMT, the 16 defendants were on trial for conspiracy to commit war crimes, crimes against humanity and peace, crimes against humanity, war crimes against soldiers of countries at war with Germany, and civilians of places occupied by Germany.Additionally, seven of the 16 defendants were charged with counts of membership in the SS, SD, or the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party, all organizations that the IMT had declared were criminal organizations. During the Justice Trial, prosecutors had to prove that the 16 defendants, who were judges and prosecutors, used their position of power to further the Nazi regime’s mission. As the prosecutors explained it, the defendants “[utilized] the emptied forms of the legal process for the persecution, enslavement, and extermination on a large scale.” The trial lasted eight months, ending on October 18, when the defendants gave their final statements. Of the 16 defendants, 10 were found guilty and four were acquitted. Four of the defendants were given a lifetime sentence, though two were released a few years after their trial. Additionally, one defendant had committed suicide after the indictment, and another defendant was sick and his case was declared a mistrial.Only two of them served life in prison. The rest of those sentenced to prison were mostly given less than 10 years, and some were even released early. One of the men who was sentenced to life was Oswald Rothaug, who functioned at the executive level of the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party and ordered the execution of Leo Katzenberger's trial, which was reenacted in the film Judgment at Nuremberg. Rothaug was released from prison on December 22, 1956.The legal path taken against Nazi war criminals was historically unprecedented. During the 1950s, the concern for pursuing justice for crimes committed in World War II was overpowered by the rise of the Cold War, so those who were imprisoned but not sentenced to death were released during this time.