law Archives - Page 57 of 81 - understand-culture

No Excuse for a Small Part

On 12 May 2011, a Munich court convicted John Demjanjuk, a former guard at the Sobibor extermination camp, of aiding and abetting the murder of 28,060 people. No single killing could be attributed to him personally. The court held that he had been part of the machinery of extermination. The verdict never became final because he died before the appeals were decided. On 15 July 2015, Oskar Gröning, called the bookkeeper of Auschwitz by the press, was sentenced to four years. The Federal Court of Justice upheld the verdict in 2016.

For Auschwitz, prosecutors had long needed proof of direct involvement in a killing. An investigation against Gröning in 1985 was dropped.

A Board Member Pays

After the Siemens corruption scandal, the company claimed damages from eleven former members of its management board for breaching their duties of organization and supervision. Ten of them settled out of court. Siemens sued former finance chief Heinz-Joachim Neubürger for 15 million euros. In December 2013 the court granted the claim. It based the ruling on the overall legal responsibility of every board member. The parties later settled for 2.5 million euros.

A Faster Fresh Start After Insolvency

For insolvency cases filed from 1 October 2020, Germany cut the time to discharge the remaining debts from six years to three. A person whose business or finances failed is free of the old debts sooner. The federal justice ministry described the goal as ein schnellerer Neuanfang, a faster new start.

The Duty to Disclose a Treatment Error

Since 26 February 2013, § 630c of the German Civil Code has required a doctor who sees signs of a treatment error to inform the patient. The duty applies when the patient asks, or when it is needed to protect the patient’s health. The next sentence protects the doctor. If the error was made by the doctor or a close relative, the disclosure may be used as evidence in criminal or administrative-fine proceedings only with the doctor’s consent.

Accident Investigation Without Blame

The German law on air accident investigation, the Flugunfall-Untersuchungs-Gesetz, says what an investigation is for. Section 3 says that it looks for the causes of an accident so that future accidents can be prevented. The same section then says what it is not for: Die Untersuchungen dienen nicht der Feststellung des Verschuldens, der Haftung oder von Ansprüchen. The investigations do not serve to establish fault, liability or claims.

The sterile cockpit rule

Below ten thousand feet, FAA regulation bars conversation not essential to the operation of the aircraft. The same regulator that requires crews to speak up also specifies when they must not. Both rules treat the channel as the thing being managed.

Cybersecurity incident disclosure

Since 2023, American public companies have had four business days to report a material cybersecurity incident to the SEC, and every US state requires notification of individuals whose personal data is breached. Even the failure of information systems is itself subject to a disclosure requirement.

Initial disclosures

Under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, parties to a lawsuit must hand over certain categories of information at the outset — witnesses, documents they may use, damages computations, insurance coverage — without any request from the other side. Discovery in American litigation begins with a push, not a pull.

Regulation FD

Adopted by the SEC in August 2000 after analysts at several Wall Street firms were found receiving information before the public. The rule is simple in principle: material non-public information must go to everyone at the same time. Telling one analyst privately is prohibited, and telling one person accidentally triggers an obligation to tell everyone immediately.

Brady v. Maryland

The Supreme Court held in 1963 that a prosecutor must turn over evidence favourable to the accused, whether or not the defence has asked for it. The obligation falls on the party holding the information, and it runs against that party’s own interest in winning. Failure to disclose can void a conviction years later.