The pyramid scheme of the Gestapo in its fight against the German resistance movement

A Cologne case study

Abstract

At some moment sooner or later in any of the big investigations and persecutions against the resistance movement conducted by the Gestapo, the German secret police of the Third Reich, they found one suspected person ready not only to reveal his own contribution to the resistance movement but to accuse other participants for their part. From the first testimony on an entire pyramid scheme of mutual allegations by the accused resistants was generated. We tried to analyze this scheme by means of methods and software developed by Social Network Analysts and were able to show how much the Gestapo benefitted from rather ordinary criminological means.