German lawyer, known as the central figure of a scandal involving the National Socialist (Nazi) politician Ernst Röhm in 1931 and 1932.
Meyer was the illegitimate son of Maria Hubertina Catharina Jünger. After the marriage of the mother with the engineer Carl Boromäus Josef Meyer in 1900, he was recognized by him as a child and thus received the surname of the father (Meyer).
After participating in the First World War, Meyer studied law and then worked as a lawyer in Regensburg. At an unexplained time, he became friends with the National Socialist politician Ernst Röhm.
After Rohm had been appointed Chief of Staff of the Sturmabteilung, the combat organization of the NSDAP, at the beginning of 1931, Meyer came to Berlin. On behalf of or at least with the consent of Röhm Meyer began in the weeks following the Stennes revolt in Berlin to research a few private letters that Röhm had written a few years earlier to doctor Karl-Günther Heimsoth, in which Röhm was outed as homosexual. Since Röhm had to regard publication of his homosexuality as a threat to his political position in the NSDAP and for his party’s support among the voters – and that homosexuality was also punishable by § 175 of the Criminal Code – he was anxious to put these letters aside. According to Paul Schulz, Meyer demanded an excessively high sum from Röhm for his services, which he then tried to shake off.
On 22 June 1931, the Social Democratic newspaper Münchener Post published an article which reported on Ernst Röhm and the surrounding gay network. Essentially, the article included an alleged report dated 22 May 1931, to Meyer and Röhm: In this letter-based report, Meyer, who claimed to be a newsreader to Röhm, shared all sorts of alleged intrigues by other NSDAP members against Röhm. The focus was on the claim that Röhm had given Meyer the confidential order to steal the Heimsoth letters, whose compromising content was hinted at, from the safe of Heimsoth’s lawyer. Meyer finally explains that he had tried everything in vain to get to the letters – Röhm should therefore reimburse his expenses.
Röhm was interrogated by the police a few days after the publication of the article on suspicion of violation of the article 175 StGB, after which he sued the Munich Post. The investigation quickly showed that Meyer’s alleged report was not authentic, ie. it had ever been addressed to Rohm, but had been specially prepared for publication in the Munich Post. Meyer and his girlfriend Elise Hergt, whom he had used as a mediator, were accused of attempting fraud against Röhm and for fraud and forgery in favour of the Munich Post. Meyer was additionally accused of perjury, as he had denied under oath to have contacted the post office. A few months later, Meyer was found hanged in his cell in the detention centre. The official cause of death was suicide.
The Meyer Affair was of lasting political importance, contributing significantly to public revelations about the homosexuality of Röhm and some other SA leaders. The “Heimsoth letters” mentioned in Meyers report were actually located and published in 1932 in a widely disseminated brochure by the Social Democrat Helmuth Klotz. A serious consequence of the publication of the Meyer Report and subsequent trials was the beginning of the break between the SA leadership and the political organization (PO) of the NSDAP, which had its starting point in the events of the summer of 1931, and the fall and murder of Röhm as well as the political disempowerment of the SA caused by the Röhm affair.
Link to Wikipedia biography (German)