Sippenhaft

Sippenhaft or Sippenhaftung (German: [ˈzɪpənˌhaft(ʊŋ)], kin liability) is a German term referring to the idea that a family can share the responsibility for a crime or act committed by one of its members; that is, it is a form of collective punishment because of family association. As a legal principle, it was derived from Germanic law in the Middle Ages, usually in the form of fines and compensations.

In traditional Germanic law (before the widespread adoption of Roman canon law), Sippenhaft accepted the idea that the clan of a criminal was liable for offenses committed by one of its members. The law of Germanic (including Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian) peoples distinguished between two forms of justice for severe crimes such as murder: blood revenge, the right to extrajudicially kill a Germanic free-man in the context of clan feuds, and blood money, called the weregild, the obligatory pecuniary restitution given to the kin of the victim in accordance with the nature of the crime and the social status of those affected. In adherence to the principle of Sippenhaft (kin liability) the kin of the offender was liable to pay the weregild in addition to or in substitution for the member that committed the crime. Similar laws were also implemented by Celtic peoples.

In Nazi Germany, the term was revived to justify the punishment of kin (relatives, spouse) for the offense of a family member. In this form of Sippenhaft the relatives of persons accused of crimes against the state were held to share the responsibility for those crimes and subject to arrest and sometimes execution. Many people who had committed no crimes were arrested and punished under Sippenhaft decrees introduced after the failed 20 July plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler in July 1944.

Examples of Sippenhaft being used as a threat exist within the Wehrmacht from around 1943. Soldiers accused of having 'blood impurities' or soldiers conscripted from areas outside of Germany also began to have their families threatened and punished with Sippenhaft. An example is the case of Panzergrenadier Wenzeslaus Leiss, who was accused of desertion on the Eastern Front in December 1942. After the Düsseldorf Gestapo discovered supposed 'Polish' links in the Leiss family, in February 1943 his wife, two-year-old daughter, two brothers, sister and brother-in-law were arrested and executed at Sachsenhausen concentration camp. By 1944, several general and individual directives were ordered within divisions and corps, threatening troops with consequences against their family. After 20 July 1944 these threats were extended to include all German troops and in particular, German commanders. A decree of February 1945 threatened death to the relatives of military commanders who showed what Hitler regarded as cowardice or defeatism in the face of the enemy. After surrendering Königsberg to the Soviets in April 1945, the family of the German commander General Otto Lasch were arrested. These arrests were publicized in the Völkischer Beobachter.

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