During World War II the Allies were determined that both Hitler and the men around him should be punished for starting World War II and the crimes they had committed while they were waging it. These crimes included the extermination of the Jewish people of Europe known as the Holocaust or the Shoah. After some debate it was decided that the fairest way to proceed was the public trial of the men and organizations who committed the crimes.
             At the most famous of these, the Nuremberg Trial, 22 individual Nazi officials, and seven groups that had been organized to carry out the Nazi programs, were placed on trial for their crimes. Martin Bormann was tried in absentia. Additionally Robert Ley was charged as a defendant but committed suicide before the trial, and Gustav Krupp, who was named in the indictments, was found to be medically unfit to stand trial. Many of the leading Nazis, such as Hitler, Himmler, and Goebbels, were not present at the Nuremberg Trial because they has committed suicide at the end of the war.
             The first step was to agree upon the rules for the trial. They adopted a combined procedure of the four Allies (the United States, Great Britain, France and the Soviet Union). The defendants were given the right to be represented by counsel, call witnesses, and present evidence in their own behalf. They were not given the right to a jury trial which was part of the law only in Great Britain and the United States. Finally, after all the evidence was presented, the defendants were permitted to make statements to the court without being sworn or cross-examined.
             The next step was the indictment, a statement of the charges against each defendant. The Allies charged the defendants with four types of crimes: conspiracy against peace, crimes against peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. The Allies stated that the Nazis, when they started the war, had deliberately broken the treaties that Germany h
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