Eck, Hoffmann, and Weisspfennig were sentenced to death. Weisspfennig was condemned because as a non-combatant under the Geneva Conventions, he was prohibited from firing weapons even in action. Eck and Hoffmann were executed because in their roles as the boat's senior officers, responsibility for the actions of their crew, as well as their own, fell directly on their shoulders. All three were shot by firing squad at Lüneburg Heath on 30 November 1945. Lenz, by virtue of his protest at the time and his written confession, had his sentence commuted to life imprisonment, while Schwender, the only man involved who had been under direct orders, was given seven years. Schwender was released in 1951; Lenz was released in 1952.