Q Therefore, they were all skilled workers, were they?
A Yes.
Q Do you know how these skilled workers were selected?
A I am afraid I can not tell you, because I was not present when they were being selected.
Q. Do you know that in these cases in which the individual industrial enterprises requested skilled workers experts were sent to test them for their skill?
A. Yes, I know that in the case of Mauthausen sometimes qualification experts who tested them for that qualification arrived in camp.
Q. These testers selected the people who had been requested by them, and if they thought that they could meet their requirements their names, or the names of these inmates, were submitted?
A. Yes. I can only speak here from experiences which I heard from other inmates, because, when these tests were given, I remember two or three occasions of that sort. I was not present.
Q. And in those letters to which you have referred in paragraph 44 of your affidavit we are concerned with orders that the first order of transfer was not to be carried out?
A. Now, after three years, I cannot remember the precise content of the letters. All I know is, as I stated before, that the letters stated that these and these inmates were not to be transferred, or must not be sent to another camp.
Q. Was any reason given why these transfers had to be discontinued?
A. It is possible but I cannot say with any certainty that the letters stated that on the basis of special order or directive, but I cannot tell you that for certain what these letters said.
Q. Can you say with any certainty, or can you not, that the term "special treatment" was mentioned in these letters at all?
A. No.
Q. You cannot say that for certain, can you?
A. No.
Q. In how many cases had this happened, of which you have spoken?
A. About three cases.
Q. And in those three cases, after you received those letters, you found out about the fatalities in the report of these people. Where did they die?
A. In the punitive company of the Mauthausen camp, as we called it. They did die.
Q. Who gave the order that these people should be transferred to the punitive company?
A. I cannot tell you whether it was the labor allocation leader or the camp leader or the protective camp leader, or as a result of conference between those two officials. I really don't know. Perhaps the commander Fiereis was also present.
Q. I wish to ask you the question at this occasion to whom was the labor assignment leader of the Mauthausen camp subordinated?
A. To the camp commander.
Q. Not to Office D-II?
A. No. Office D-II -- the letters from Office D-II in some cases reached the offices of the labor allocation leader, but the mail went on principle to the commandant of the camp.
Q. Did the labor allocation leader in the Mauthausen camp have also other tasks apart from directing labor allocation work?
A. Yes.
Q. What did he do?
A. The leader of the protective custody camp in Mauthausen was for approximately half a year also the protective custody camp leader, who usually looked after the duties connected with that office.
Q. Who in that period of time when you were in the concentration camp of Mauthausen were the labor allocation leaders?
A. Obersturmfuehrer Schuetz, Oberscharfuehrer Luetscha, and Obersturmfuehrer Dittmann.
Q. Where are these people now?
A. Hauptsturmfuehrer Schuetz is, I am told, dead. Oberscharfuehrer Leutscha is in Dachau, and Obersturmfuehrer Dittmann is supposed to be also in Dachau.
Q. Do you know the defendant Sommer?
A. No
Q. You only know his name?
A. Yes.
Q. How do you know that the defendant Sommer is called "Karl"?
A. I read that in some decrees which in the organization of the D-II it appeared, or whole of the WVHA.
Q. If I remember right, you quite spontaneously, without my soliciting it, told me that Sommer was always -- was never very much liked by the camp commandants. In fact, you told me that they hated him, is that correct?
A. Yes.
Q. You also gave me the information why you told me this. Will you repeat this before this Tribunal?
A. Sommer was regarded at Mauthausen as an extremely exacting worker who kept issuing orders concerning the statistics which were to be sent to Berlin. He always complained about these statistics.
Q. What did he complain about of which had happened, for instance?
A. That the commandant of Mauthausen gave the order that inmates who were used some days as skilled workers should be sent over there. In some cases for private purposes of the camp, special work for the commandant was ordered, for instance, for the leader of the protective custody camp, etc. If the report did not clarify that point, then a letter from Sommer would come in immediately asking for information.
Q. In your affidavit you repeatedly made reference to statistics which were being sent to D-II. Did you mean by these statistics the monthly survey which is contained in the files submitted by the prosecution, and which I showed you yesterday?
A. Yes.
DR. BELZER: This is Document NO-1961, which the prosecution has submitted.
Q. What other reports were sent by the labor allocation office of the camp to Office D-II?
A. There were no constant reports which were to be sent regularly. It happened occasionally that Office D-II, on the basis of a teletype letter, requested special statistics concerning the number of inmates, the number of skilled workers, and things of that sort.
Q. Did you know the official regulation for the labor allocation and the issue of bonuses?
A. I know a regulation for the labor allocation. Whether we were ever given the whole full bunch of orders I do not know, as letters or directives issued concerning the inmates were not shown to us - as far as they were secret.
Q. When was this service regulation issued?
A. I believe it must have been in 1943.
Q. Could it have been later?
A. Possibly.
Q. In the period of time when you were an inmate in the Mauthausen concentration camp was there any change made concerning the roll calls?
A. Yes.
Q. What was the change?
A. The roll calls - I believe in the last half of 1944 - were decreased in number, that is to say, we no longer had three roll calls daily but only two. The noon roll call was discontinued. Later, in the last months, if I remember correctly, the evening roll call also was discontinued.
DR. BELZER: I have no further questions.
THE PRESIDENT: Any cross examination by other defense counsel?
CROSS EXAMINATION BY DR. FROESCHMANN (for defendant Mummenthey):
Q. Witness, you said just now that the punitive company had been a feature of the concentration camp life.
A. Yes.
Q. That punitive company, in other words, was decided on by the commandant?
A. Yes, the commandant decided who was to go into the punitive company.
Q. May I then from the point of view of your affidavit NO-3104, and in particular under paragraphs 30 and 31, ask you to make a small correction. I think you probably were the victim there of misconception on the part of the interrogator. "The punitive company of Mauthausen also belonged to the DEST company."
A. Perhaps I could explain something about that. The punitive company of Mauthausen was charged in the accounts to DEST, on their account.
Q. It was not part of the DEST?
A. It was part of it in as much as they went to the quarry together with the detachments of the DEST.
Q. But if you use the word "belonged" to DEST, of course, one is apt to assume that it was simply part of the property of DEST. The inmates who went out to work had been supplied by the commandant's office. The commandant had decided when they were to work. Therefore, that is how you meant that word "belonged", I suppose.
A. Yes. Also in as much as DEST, of course, had requested these people.
Q. Oh, yes, certainly. All I wanted to clarify was that the term "belonged to DEST" was not to be understood to the effect that this punitive company was, as it were, formed by DEST. But it was formed and put together by the commandant and sent over there in order to work for DEST?
A. Yes, that is correct.
Q. Then I wanted to ask you this: Under paragraph 32 you refer to a quarry of concentration camp Mauthausen. What did you mean by that?
A. I meant the quarry which was used by DEST for their work and which belonged to DEST.
Q. Wasn't that what was known as Wiener Graben?
A. Yes.
Q. And in paragraph 33 you speak of some steps leading to the quarry. Is that also referred to as Wiener Graben?
A. Yes.
Q. Then would you please look at paragraph 37 in the affidavit. There you say - and I shall quote: "In the second half of 1941 we received Russian prisoners of war in the Mauthausen concentration camp. In winter 1941 and 1942, 200 or 300 of those Russian prisoners of war were working in the Mauthausen quarry."
A. Yes.
Q. Do you know anything about the fact that these Russian prisoners of war were used in order to obtain skilled workers for the stone mason industry? Were they to be trained?
A. I know that young Russians were trained for the stone mason industry. Whether these Russians - they were small boys, 15 or 16 years old - were prisoners of war I don't know, I can't tell you for certain.
Q. May I in this connection ask you to tell the Tribunal, in order to avoid misunderstanding, what is meant by this re-training - what you mean in German when you say somebody is being re-trained?
A. These young Russians were used in order to learn the profession of a stone mason. They had their own work shops in the camp where they were accommodated, in a block of their own, in part of a block, and worked - as I heard - in the quarry in a special hut where the stone masons were working.
Q. In other words, we have in this re-training no training in the sense of national socialist ideology?
A. No, no, certainly not.
Q. Another question. In paragraph 40 you speak of releases.
A. Yes.
Q. ---which were to be carried out in the Mauthausen camp. Let me ask you first of all: Where does your knowledge come from concerning these releases?
A. It very frequently happened that my chief called me into his office and gave me the name of an inmate, telling me to look up his file card to see where this inmate was working. I then saw on his desk - as we as inmates were very interested in this - letters which roughly read like this: "Inmate X has been suggested for his release and we want a report about his conduct."
Q. Did the commandant's office at Mauthausen camp comply with this request? Did they give good conduct reports?
A. No, there never were good conduct reports given, as far as releases were concerned.
Q. If and when a request for release had been submitted, did the commandant's office contact DEST at Mauthausen?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you know that DEST, with its main administration in Berlin, took the point of view as a matter of principle to agree always to releases, but, of course, that they needed a substitute for whomever they lost by way of release? Do you know that?
A. No. All I know is that the Obersturmfuehrer who was my chief said to me, when the index said this inmate was a stone mason or a skilled worker in the quarry, he cannot be released.
Q. Do you know anything about the fact that the labor exchange in Germany frequently took the workers out of one enterprise and sent them to another enterprise?
A. I heard about that, but as I was in the camp more or less throughout the war, I cannot say anything about that from my own knowledge.
Q. What I wanted to ask you is whether you knew of similar occurrences from your activity in Mauthausen camp that the concentration camp of Mauthausen took an inmate away from one place of work and sent him to another firm, and that the firm opposed this. Have you ever heard of such occurrences?
A. No, I have not.
Q Then about paragraph 41. You speak there of 2,000 Dutch Jews who joined you in fall of 1941 or the early summer of 1942. Were those Jews allocated to the punitive company?
A Yes they were all of them sent to the punitive company.
DR. FROESCHMANN: I have no further questions, if the Tribunal please.
CROSS EXAMINATION BY DR. SEIDL: (For defendant Oswald Pohl)
Q Witness, in paragraph 42 of your affidavit you speak of food experiments. When were these experiments carried out?
A I believe in 1942 or 1943; it might have been 1944.
Q 1942, 1943, or 1944?
A Yes, I am afraid I cannot remember the exact date.
Q On how many inmates were these experiments carried out?
A There were about several hundred inmates. It was called Eastern Food.
Q But in your affidavit you said that about a thousand Russian prisoners of war had been used for these experiments.
A Yes, new experiments were being made all the time. On one occasion three or four hundred inmates would be given for about three months the Eastern Diet - as it was called - some sort of porridge. Other inmates after another period of time were given another porridge which would form another type of diet. This went on and on, about a total of one thousand inmates were used for this Eastern Diet in the course of time.
Q Were they civilian inmates or prisoners of war?
A They were prisoners of war.
Q Of what did this porridge consist, which the inmates were given to eat?
A I never saw it myself. I know about this matter through the camp Elder of the Mauthausen who carried it out and to whom I talked sometime about the fatality reports which reached us.
Q Do you know who gave the order to have these food experiments carried out?
A No, I could not tell you.
Q Have you made any observations about the type of effect which the experiments and the diet had on the inmates?
A The food had, as several doctors and others said, -- the effect was dysentary, which led to death.
Q Did you yourself observe that inmates died as a result?
A I did not see it myself. I was in the hospital and I saw the inmates who died there, and so I asked, what is the matter with him, and then I was told he was given this miserable Eastern Diet.
Q Can you tell me with any certainty that these inmates who died had not died from another illness? Are you quite certain they didn't?
AAll I can say is that the inmates were healthy, they did not go out to work; they were only in their block, they could not leave it, were not beaten for that reason, were not given any hard work they were there among themselves - and I could not think of any other reason than if they would have had an infectious disease we would have heard.
Q Can you tell me what the purpose of these experiments was?
A No, I could not tell you.
Q You say that they were a dietician's experiments; surely you must have some idea what the purpose was behind this idea.
A I assume that the idea was, as the inmates were not given any bread, no soup, but only this porridge, that a special test was to be carried out to see how long someone could subsist on that type of diet. They were not used for work.
Q It depended, in other words, on the way the experiments were carried out whether or not damage was done to a man's health because otherwise you could simply give them something else to eat, is that correct?
A Yes.
DR. SEIDL: I have no further questions.
DR. BELZER: (for defendant Sommer): May it please the Tribunal, the interrogation by Dr. Froeschmann gives me cause to put one single question to the witness.
BY DR. BELZER:
Q Witness, you speak repeatedly of punitive companies. Is it known to you that the punitive companies were discontinued after 1943 or 1944?
A I know nothing about that. All I know is that the punitive company towards in one of the late years, which I do not remember was camouflaged in the statistical reports.
DR. BELZER: Thank you.
JUDGE PHILLIPS: Witness, in paragraph 44 of your affidavit the English translation roads as follows: "I myself read letters in 1944, 1945 signed 'for Karl Sommer." Do you mean the letters were signed for him, or by him?
WITNESS: They were signed by him. The signature below underneath the letter.
JUDGE PHILLIPS: I notice further in paragraph 44 that you say that inmates were mentioned in these letters by name, for whom Sommer ordered special treatment. How many letters - or about how many letters did you receive signed by Sommer ordering special treatment for inmates?
WITNESS: About three letters by Sommer which were of that type, is what I have seen. About three.
JUDGE PHILLIPS: Now, can you give us an estimate of the number of inmates that were named in these three letters?
WITNESS: There were about two to four inmates named in those letters.
JUDGE PHILLIPS: In each letter, or the three letters together?
WITNESS: No, no, in each letter two or three inmates, or perhaps four, as far as I can remember.
JUDGE PHILLIPS: Did those inmates receive special treatment?
WITNESS: These inmates have been killed about three or five days later. I received a report about the fatalities.
JUDGE PHILLIPS: All told, your affidavit contains 45 paragraphs. You were asked certain paragraphs in this affidavit. Others you were not asked about. Those that you were not asked about, do the statements as outlined and contained in these paragraphs speak the truth?
WITNESS: Yes.
THE PRESIDENT: Were all the inmates who were mentioned in Sommer's letters -- did they die?
WITNESS: Of these three or four letters which I still recall they were all killed; they died, yes.
THE PRESIDENT: That would perhaps mean 10 or 12?
WITNESS: About 12 people, yes.
THE PRESIDENT: Do you know yourself how they died -- what brought about their death?
WITNESS: I cannot give you precise details. As far as I remember those were - as it was called - "shot while trying to escape." That is, they were sent to the punitive company, to the quarry - then shot while attempting to escape.
THE PRESIDENT: These were skilled workers, you said.
WITNESS: Yes, they were skilled workers.
THE PRESIDENT: Why would they be sent to the quarry?
WITNESS: What I assumed at the time was that it was for Sommer's letter. I saw no other order.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, Sommer's letter, you said, merely asked that as skilled workers they are not to be transferred from Mauthausen.
WITNESS: Yes.
THE PRESIDENT: It didn't say anything about assigning them to the quarry, did it?
WITNESS: No.
THE PRESIDENT: And it didn't say anything about special treatment.
WITNESS: No. All he said was that for some reason or other they were not to be sent out to do work nor were they to be sent to another camp.
THE PRESIDENT: They were to stay in Mauthausen?
WITNESS: Yes.
THE PRESIDENT: Did you get the reports of their death, and the reason, the cause of death?
WITNESS: What we received was simply the report that they were dead. Altogether reports normally said - "Inmate has died" - even if they had been beaten or flogged to death; the exceptions were executions, and there the term "execution" was put into the report; or else the other two points also "suicide by running into an electrically charged wire" -
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I am just interested in these particular inmates. They were healthy, skilled workers, were they?
WITNESS: Yes.
THE PRESIDENT: Can you think of any reason for wanting to kill such healthy, skilled workers?
WITNESS: There were so many people killed in Mauthausen your Honor, that one cannot always give the reason in an individual death. It was part of the day's program that inmates were killed.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, usually they were the sick or worn out prisoners that were killed -- isn't that true?
WITNESS: The worn out ones, or the ones who were ill, in some cases were sent to recreational homes, as they were called, were they were gassed.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, no matter how they were killed they didn't kill valuable workmen, did they, as a rule?
WITNESS: The camp did not mind too much; if and when the commandant, or the protective custody leader, or somebody, a block leader was dissatisfied for some reason they did not care whether they were skilled workers, or assistant workers, or Poles or Russians.
THE PRESIDENT: The attitude of the camp commander was that he had more to do with it than the state of health of an inmate?
WITNESS: I am sorry I didn't quite understand the question.
(Question repeated by interpreter.)
A Yes. That is quite correct.
BY THE PRESIDENT:
Q Now, the punishment details. Who assigned inmates to the punishment details, the penal details.
A The inmates were sent to the penal details by the protective custody camp leader, by the commandant, by the administrative leader, and by a number of lower leaders - roll call leaders and so forth.
Q. But never by anyone in the factories or plants?
A. The factories also, when they had committed an offense. I am not informed about the details, but then an inmate would be sent to the cebak detauk bext nirbubg.
Q. But the decision would lay with the commander or one of his subordinates?
A. Yes.
Q. All right.
BY MR. WOLF: Your Honor, I have a few more questions.
Q. Witness, it is not true that the inmates who were working in the penal detail in Mauthausen in the quarry, were part of DEST quite as much as the other inmates who were working for DEST?
A. Yes.
Q. How do you know that?
A. I know that because as far as the accounts were concerned which we sent to DEST, they listed the number of inmates, all the details who worked in the quarry these were contained therein.
Q. It it true, witness, that on a number of occasions you talked to Walter, Grimm and Eisenhoefer, who were then the managers of DEST in Mauthausen in this respect?
A. Yes.
DR. SEIDL. (Counsel for Defendant Pohl): I object to this question. The witness is to answer himself and not simply say yes to a question, the contents of which have been put into his mouth.
THE PRESIDENT: How could you ask a witness a question whether he had talked to a certain man without mentioning the man's name? That isn't a leading question. There is no other way to get the information. "Did you ever see Dr. Seidl?" "Did you ever see Mr. Wolf?" How, other-wise, can you ask the question?
DR. SEIDL: In my opinion, the Prosecution should have asked: "Have you ever talked to somebody of a certain enterprise?" If the witness then remembers names, it is all in order. But if he doesn't, then the question *---* tion has been answered in the negative therby.
THE PRESIDENT: All right. The objection is overruled.
BY MR. WOLF:
Q. Will you please answer my question.
A. I talked to Walter, Grimm and Eisenhoefer who were with the DEST at the time. I talked to them in the office of the Labor Allocation Office.
Q. What were the contents of these conversations?
A. We were concerned with a number of problems in these conversations. For one, DEST wanted to have some inmates. On the other hand, as I said before, releases were becoming an acute problem. Then we had the problem that they no lawyer did not want to have certain inmates who were not suitable for the work
Q. Is it correct, therefore, that if you sent the bills for DEST you listed this statistical information which you had gathered from the statistical report, and based your bills on that fact?
A. Yes.
Q. Did the statistics contain the fact that these inmates who were working for DEST in the quarry, were listed as punative detail?
A. No; the way they were listed was as stone carriers.
Q. What was a stone carrier in Mauthausen?
A. He was in the punative company.
Q. And now, another matter. Your department, labor allocation, in the camp Mauthausen...Is is correct that you received orders, instructions and directives from the office D-2 addressed to the Labor Allocation Department? It was not always necessary that these decrees had to go through the camp commandant.
A. Oh, yes, as all the other mail, it reached first the commandant.
THE PRESIDENT: Now, Dr. Seidl, that is a real leading question. That is a dandy.
DR. SEIDL: I have not objected because the answer of the witness was in the negative.
BY. MR. WOLF:
Q. Please continue.
A. The mail, the whole mail of the camp, went through the commandant in as much as we, as inmates, saw the mail at all. In how far secret or confidential mail was sent to the various agencies direct -- I am wholly Labor Allocation Office in closed envelopes, direct. But I can't tell you what was said in them. I know that because on Schuetz's desk a number of letters from the WVHA were lying around, the contents of which I do not knew.
MR. WOLF: I have not further questions. Your Honor--One more question, which Mr. Robbins has asked me to ask, Your Honor.
BY MR. WOLF:
Q. Is it correct, witness, that the Labor allocation Officer in Nauthausen--
DR. SEIDL: I am afraid I must object. This is obviously a leading question.
THE PRESIDENT: He hasn't even asked him a question. You are afraid it is going to be leading.
DR. SEIDL: From the way the question started, it is quite obvious that the answer is to be put into the witness's mouth. Any questions which begins: "Is it true.." It it correct.." is obviously a loading question, by its nature. I am unable to see that the Prosecution would ask a question beginning with "Is it true..or correct.." If he expects the witness to say no.
THE PRESIDENT: Oh, maybe that is exactly what he docs expect, Now, you remember what you said, Dr. Seidl, that any question that begins "Is it true..." is a leading question. You remember, now, you said that; you will find that hanging right around your neckbefore you get through.
Go ahead with your question, and then we will rule on it.
BY MR. WOLF:
Did the Labor Allocation Officer in Mauthausen receive orders from the office D-2 in Berlin?
A. Yes, Of course.
Q. What sort of orders?
A. All orders which came--the whole mail which at all concerned labor allocation, be they transfer of inmates, technicalities of the work, new statistics; anything connected with the allocation of inmates.
MR. WOLF: That is all, Your Honor.
BY JUDGE MUSMANNO:
Q. Witness, may I ask a question, please.
Going back just from the moment to the subject of the letters which you received from Sommer, do I understand that these letter actually specifically mentioned various names of individuals who were to be subjected to "special treatment?"
A. No, Your Honor. These letters which I received from Sommer concerned inmates whose names were mentioned, who for some reason, were not to be used for work in the camp, or were to remain in the camp, or else were not to be transferred to another camp.
Q. Well, then, how did they become subjects for "special treatment?"
A. Because those inmates, then after three of five days, were dead; and we inmates used the term "special treatment" quite generally. We knew of no other expression except "special treatment" when an inmate for some abscure reason was treated differently from the others and then suddenly died soon afterwards.
Q. Well, did you understand from the letters that they were eventualy to become victims of "special treatment?"
A. I personally assumed sc--si did we inmates---that the death of the inmated was referred to by the letter, and that that amounted to the "special treatment".
Q. Very well.
DR. FROESCHMANN (Counsel for defendant Mummenthey).
If the Tribunal please, I have a very few questions which have arisen from Mr. Wolf's cross-examination.
RE-CROSS EXAMINATION BY DR. FROESCHMANN:
Q. Witness, you spoke of the statistics just now which were drawn up in Mauthausen concentration camp concerning the inmates who had been employed to DEST.
A. This was not so much a matter of statistics, but merly the bills which we made out on the basis of the statistics. The DEST statistics consisted of a card index which named the inmated for DEST.
A. And then you sent a bill to DEST concerning the hours of work done by the inmates?
A. Yes.
Q. Did that bill show where the inmates were working?
A. No, the bill simply read "Skilled workers...assistant workers.." total this was on the front --and on the back side: "so-and--so many workers 50 pfennigs per hour..1 mark 50.." and this was added up.
Q. There fore, the term "stone carriers" was not named in the bill?
A. No, it was not named in the bill. But they were on the sale labor voucher in merely on the back.
Q. The DEST did not see that, did they?
A. Oh, yes, These little vouchers came in from DEST. I don't know from whom. The detachment loader signed it, and there it said on the back, that fifty inmates were working as locksmiths--one thousand on stone work.. stone carriers..and so on. And this was added up, and this we called the work vouchers.
Q. Probably misunderstood you before. You mean stone carriers?
A. Yes, I meant stone carriers--not stone process workers.
Q.- Another question. Do you remember whether, in these conversations between Walter, Grimm and the others, and yourself, of the DEST management, with the labor allocation leader, certain wishes by the DEST were voiced concerning the feeding, clothing, and so forth?
A.- I was not present when those conversations took place. I could not tell you. As an inmate I was only called in when something special was neede, such as card-index files, or a list of professions, and so forth.
Q.- The Prosecution have used the term. "In this respect". Did you talk about that particular problem? And you said yes to that question, What did you mean by that?
A.- If I remember that question correctly, they were talking then about the question of releases of inmates.
Q. That was the point about which I have already asked you questions. When there was a request for release from Berlin, DEST was contacted.
DR. FROESCHMANN: No further questions.
DR. BELZER (Counsel for defendant Sommer): I believe that the witness has not fully understood Judge Musmanno's last question. In order to clarify this I would appreciate it if I might put another question to this witness.
BY DR. BELZER:
Q.- Witness, Judge Musmanno asked you whether you could see from the letters that the "special treatment" which the inmates had to suffer later on was to be carried out. What I would like to ask you is this: Did you see Sommer's letters before you heard the reports of fatalities or afterwards.
A.- Letters of Sommer's of that type, I saw before the reports of fatalities came in.
Q.- Before you received the reports about fatalities and did not know where these inmates had been taken to -- did you deduce from the contents of those letters that for those inmates "special treatment" had been ordered?