Immediately after the conclusion of the Nuremberg trial, the U.S. attorney Telford Taylor was appointed chief prosecutor for a series of IMT trials at Nuremberg of second-tier Nazis, whose complicity was deemed serious enough to warrant consideration of the death penalty. In these cases, later known as the Subsequent Nuremberg Proceedings, defendants represented many segments of German state and society, from jurists and politicians to physicians, businessmen, and army officers. In 1947 and 1948, under the auspices of the IMT, the United States held 12 such trials at Nuremberg. There were 185 individuals indicted, of whom 177 were actually tried.

These later tribunals generally imposed lighter sentences than those passed down by the original IMT. Only 12 defendants were actually executed, 8 were sentenced to life in prison, and 77 were given shorter prison terms. As a result of postwar clemency and the realities of Cold War politics, many sentences were later commuted or reduced.