Rudolf Mildner Rudolf Mildner ( July 7 , 1902 – 1953 ? ) was an SS - Standartenführer who served as the chief of the Gestapo at Katowice and who was the head of the political department at Auschwitz which conducted " third degree " methods of interrogation from March 1941 until September 1943 . As such , he frequently sent prisoners to Auschwitz for incarceration or execution . He visited Auschwitz on several occasions . In December 1944 , he was appointed chief of the SiPo , Gestapo and SD in Vienna . After the war , Mildner testified at the Nuremberg Trials and remained in custody until 1949 . Early life . Born in Johannestal , Austrian Silesia , Mildner served as a volunteer in the Austro - Hungarian Navy during World War I . After the war , Mildner served in the Freikorps Sudetenland . Mildner trained to become a police officer in Salzburg . In 1925 , he entered the Austrian police service . During that time Mildner furthered his education by attending night school . Nazi career . He became a member of the NSDAP in 1931 with number 614 , 080 . He achieved a doctorate of law at the University of Innsbruck in 1934 . In 1935 he was forced to leave Austria and move to Germany . There he became a German citizen and entered the SS ( number 275 , 741 ) . Milder obtained a position in the political police department in Munich . After the 1938 Anschluss , Mildner became chief of the Gestapo in Linz and in 1939 in Salzburg , Austria . From December 1939 to early 1941 he led the Gestapo at Chemnitz . In March 1941 he was named as the head of the Gestapo in Katowice . It was through this office that Mildner became connected to the concentration camp at Auschwitz and served as head of a " kangaroo court " which sentenced some 2 , 000 Poles to death . In 1942 , he received the War Merit Cross , 2nd class for fighting the enemies of the Reich . In September 1943 , Mildner was transferred to occupied Danmark as Gestapo chief to fight the Danish resistance movement and organize the " evacuation " of the Danish Jews . " Mildner oversaw security in Denmark in 1943 when most of the country ' s 8 , 000 Jews were ordered arrested and deported to Auschwitz – though they were rescued after Danish resistance leaders were tipped off . " This failure was held against Mildner and he was transferred out of Denmark in January 1944 . He then served as Inspector of the SiPo and SD in Kassel . From March 1944 to June 1944 he was Deputy Chief of sub - offices IVA and IVB ( Enemies of the Regime & Activities of the Sects and Churches ) in the RSHA . In December 1944 , he was appointed the successor of Franz Josef Huber as chief of the SiPo , Gestapo and SD in Vienna . After Vienna was captured by the Russians , Mildner returned to Linz where he was the deputy of Franz Josef Huber . In May 1945 , he escaped to the west and was arrested by the American army and testified at the Nuremberg Trials . The U . S . Army detained Mildner and " saved him from landing in the hands of war crimes investigators , because his knowledge of communist subversion was considered useful . " Nuremberg trials . At Nuremberg he testified with regards to Ernst Kaltenbrunner . Mildner declared that while he was Gestapo leader at Katowice he frequently sent prisoners to Auschwitz for imprisonment or execution . He visited Auschwitz on several occasions and was shown the extermination installations . Mildner stated that he had tried to prevent the Jewish persecution in Denmark but was overruled by Himmler . He was released in 1949 and disappeared to escape prosecution . His place and date of death are unknown ; Adolf Eichmann claimed to have met Mildner in Argentina in 1958 , but this claim has not been verified .