ABSTRACT
On June 21, 1921, defendant Soghomon Tehlirian, appeared before the Berlin Criminal Court. He faced the death penalty for murder if the twelve jurymen upheld the charge of premeditated homicide against him. The personal background details presented by Tehlirian made him a year younger than he really was, doubtless to make it appear that he could not have been old enough to join the volunteers in the Caucasus at the beginning of the war. The pleadings of two of the most famous members of the Berlin bar and of the greatest jurist in Germany, who provided Tehlirian's defense, raised such curiosity that most lawyers present in the Palace of Justice left what they were doing to be present. The president found it difficult to pronounce the acquittal and withdrawal of the indictment. The prosecutor announced that there would be no appeal.
