Editing Karl-Otto Koch (section)

==Prosecution and death==

Koch's actions at Buchenwald first caught the attention of [[Josias, Hereditary Prince of Waldeck and Pyrmont|SS-Obergruppenführer Josias]], Prince of Waldeck and Pyrmont, in 1941. While perusing the death list of Buchenwald, Hereditary Prince Josias had seen the name of [[Walter Kraemer|Walter Krämer]], a head hospital orderly at Buchenwald, which he recognized because Krämer had successfully treated him in the past. Hereditary Prince Josias investigated the case and found that Koch, as the Camp Commandant, had ordered Krämer and Karl Peix, a hospital attendant, killed as "political prisoners" because they had treated him for [[syphilis]] and he feared it might be discovered.<ref name=P341>{{citation | last = Hackett | first = David A. | title= The Buchenwald Report | publisher = Westview Press | year = 1995 | page = 341 }}</ref> Josias also received reports that a certain prisoner had been shot while attempting to escape, and discovered that in fact, the prisoner had been told to get water from a well some distance from the camp, then was shot from behind; he had also helped treat Koch for syphilis.

By that time, Koch had been transferred to the Majdanek concentration camp in Poland, but his wife, Ilse, was still living at the Commandant's house in Buchenwald. Waldeck ordered a full-scale investigation of the camp by [[Georg Konrad Morgen]], an SS officer who was an SS-judge in the [[SS Court Main Office]]. As a result of the investigation, more of Koch's orders to kill prisoners at the camp were revealed, as well as embezzlement of property stolen from prisoners.<ref name="P341"/> The Kochs had used the massive Nazi apparatus to gain an enormous amount of wealth.<ref name="P341" /> The Kochs were both arrested in August 1943 to await trial by an SS court.

SS Judge [[Konrad Morgen]] formally indicted the Kochs on 17 August 1944, charging Karl Koch with the "embezzlement and concealing of funds and goods in an amount of at least 200,000 RM," and the "premeditated murder" of three inmates—ostensibly to prevent them from giving evidence to the SS investigatory commission. Ilse was charged with the "habitual receiving of stolen goods, and taking for her benefit at least 25,000 RM..."<ref>{{cite book |last=Jardim |first=Tomaz |title=Ilse Koch on Trial: Making the 'Bitch of Buchenwald' |publisher=Harvard University Press |location=Cambridge, MA |year=2023 |url=https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674249189 |isbn=9780674249189|pages=64–65}}</ref> 
The trial resulted in Koch being sentenced to death for disgracing both himself and the SS.<ref name=Schutzstaffel>{{cite web|title=Schutzstaffel: The SS|url=http://www.germaniainternational.com/ss25.html|publisher=Germania International|access-date=18 May 2009}}</ref> Koch was executed by [[firing squad]] on 5 April 1945<ref name="P341"/> one week before American allied troops arrived [[Buchenwald concentration camp#Liberation from Nazi Germany|to liberate the camp]].<ref>Mark Jacobson: The Lampshade: A Holocaust Detective Story from Buchenwald to New Orleans, Simon and Schuster, 14 September 2010 p. 15</ref> 
Contrary to some claims, however, Karl's body was not burned in the camp's crematoria, as they had run short of coal and had stopped operating in mid-March 1945. Instead, his body was disposed of in an unknown location.<ref>{{cite book |last=Jardim |first=Tomaz |title=Ilse Koch on Trial: Making the 'Bitch of Buchenwald' |publisher=Harvard University Press |location=Cambridge, MA |year=2023 |url=https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674249189 |isbn=9780674249189|page=77}}</ref>