Hello and welcome to my website. My name is David Lee and I am the author of three history books. 

My first two books, Beachhead Assault and Up Close and Personal are both about World War II and both are oral histories, the results of hundreds of interviews with World War II veterans.

My most recent book is Hitler's Crime Fighter - The Extraordinary Life of Konrad Morgen. This is a biography of SS Investigating Judge and Reich Police Official Konrad Morgen. He carried out the very first successful criminal investigation of a concentration camp commandant and he did it not after, but during World War II. In total he arrested five concentration camp commandants and two were executed as a result. Overall he investigated 800 members of the SS and 200 were brought to trial. His official job was investigate members of the SS for corruption but Morgen went way outside his brief and investigated them for murder too.

Key to understanding Konrad Morgen is the law and legal systems in Nazi Germany. Although orders issued by Adolf Hitler or his subordinates with his authority were deemed as legal and could not be challenged in the courts, murder was a still a crime. Konrad Morgen worked out that if a member of the SS killed someone without a legal order from Hitler then Morgen could investigate him for murder. And that is exactly what he did. As you can imagine, along the way he made numerous enemies high up inside the SS who tried their best to get rid of him. Surprisingly they failed and he lived to give evidence in a number of trials after the War ended.

Since he died in 1982 Konrad Morgen has attracted the attention of historians and academics, whose views I discuss in the final chapter of my book. He is of particular interest to legal academics and the world of legal philosophy because his career prompts the question, what would or should any one of us have done in his situation? 

I recommend my book to you. There is a preview below. For a full page preview click here.