Career
As an aide to Erich von dem Bach Zelewski he first suggested the site of the former Polish artillery barracks in the Zasole suburb of Oswiecim for a concentration camp in January 1940. This site would evolve into the Auschwitz concentration camp which went on to become a major site of the Nazi "Final Solution to the Jewish question" resulting in the death of up to 1,000,000 Jews. In 1981 Wigand was found guilty in Hamburg for war crimes (Staatsanwaltschaft Hamburg, 147 Js 8/75), and sentenced to 12.5 years, he was represented by lawyer Jürgen Rieger.