Einsatzgruppen trial

The United States of America vs. Otto Ohlendorf, et al., commonly known as the Einsatzgruppen trial, was the ninth of the twelve "subsequent Nuremberg trials" for war crimes and crimes against humanity after the end of World War II between 1947 and 1948. The accused were 24 former SS leaders who, as commanders of the Einsatzgruppen, were responsible for the mass killing of more than a million victims in the Eastern Front.

The Einsatzgruppen trial was held by United States authorities at the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg in the American occupation zone before US military courts, not before the International Military Tribunal. All of the accused were found guilty: fourteen were sentenced to death by hanging and eight received prison sentences ranging from life imprisonment to time served. Two were only convicted of being a member of an illegal organization, one committed suicide before the arraignment, and one was removed from the trial for medical reasons. Otto Ohlendorf, Erich Naumann, Paul Blobel, and Werner Braune were executed in 1951 while the others sentenced to death had their sentences commuted.

The trial marked the first use of the term "genocide" in legal context, being used by both the prosecution and by the judges in the verdict.