Johnson T. Crawford

Johnson Tal Crawford (31 August 1889 – 1 January 1955) was an American lawyer and jurist. He was a district judge in Pontotoc County, Oklahoma, United States from 1936 to 1946. In the Subsequent Nuremberg Trials, he co-judged both the Doctors' Trial and the RuSHA Trial. The collective judgement from the Doctors' Trial led to the establishment of the Nuremberg Code.

Early life Johnson Tal Crawford was born 31 August 1889 in Washington County, Arkansas.

He received his law degree from Oklahoma University. and his wife (m. 12 October 1875 in Milton County, Georgia) Mary Avarilla Cogburn (1858–1916), and a sister of Phillip Henry Rogers (b. 23 September 1877) when she was a stenographer at the county courthouse in Ada, Oklahoma. They married on 3 July 1923 at the Central Presbyterian Church, Sherman, Grayson County, Texas. Jessie had also previously worked as a secretary for her brother-in-law Wallie, a local general practice physician.

District Judge He was a judge from about 1924 a court with general jurisdiction over almost all civil and criminal matters within its sphere of influence. To be able to go to Nuremberg he resigned from the district court, but hoped to return to Ada to practice law following the war crimes tribunals. As a member of Military Tribunal I, as part of the Subsequent Nuremberg Trials at Nuremberg, he judged both the Doctors' trial (along with Walter B. Beals, Harold Sebring, and Lt. Col. Victor C. Swearingen) and the RuSHA Trial.

Legacy The collective judgement from the Doctors' Trial led to the establishment of the Nuremberg Code, His papers are held in the Linscheid Library of East Central University.

Family life He was informally known by his middle name "Tal" and his wife Jessie Frank as "Jess". Their daughter Talicia Diane Crawford (30 March 1924 in Ada, Oklahoma - 25 September 2000 in Great Falls, Virginia), married George Fitzgerald Smoot Jr. on 14 July 1943 in Escambia County, Florida, and had issue including: George Fitzgerald Smoot III (b. 20 February 1945)