Justice Department continues its prosecution of alleged Nazi war criminals (06/20/04)

Justice Department continues its prosecution of alleged Nazi war criminals

PARSIPPANY, N.J. - The U.S. Justice Department's prosecution of persons alleged to have participated in Nazi war crimes continues, as evidenced by the latest developments in two cases involving Ukrainian immigrants to this country.

On June 14 the Associated Press reported that a federal immigration judge had ordered the deportation of Jakiw Palij, 80, of Jackson Heights, N.Y.

Prosecutors from the U.S. Attorney's Office and the U.S. Justice Department's Office of Special Investigations (OSI) allege that Mr. Palij misrepresented his service as a guard at a labor camp in Nazi-occupied Poland and his membership in several Nazi-led units that committed atrocities against civilians during World War II.

The AP reported that Mr. Palij has denied taking part in atrocities, but told federal investigators he was recruited from his Polish village and worked for the SS at the Trawniki forced-labor camp for two months in 1943.

On May 9, 2002, the Justice Department had asked a federal court in Brooklyn, N.Y., to revoke Mr. Palij's U.S. citizenship for his alleged participation "in acts of persecution against Jewish civilians while serving during World War II as an armed guard at an SS slave-labor camp in Nazi-occupied Poland."

Then, on July 31, 2003, a U.S. federal judge stripped Mr. Palij of his U.S. citizenship, saying he illegally acquired an immigrant visa when he entered the country over 50 years ago as a refugee of World War II. The defendant "made material misrepresentations in his application for a visa to immigrate to the United States," U.S. Federal Judge Allyne Ross said in that ruling.

After reviewing the 2003 decision, Judge Robert Owens on June 10 ordered that Mr. Palij be deported to Ukraine, where his native village is now located.

The AP reported that Mr. Palij, when asked to comment on the latest ruling, would only say, "Everybody knows all my stories." He referred questions to his lawyer, who declined to take phone calls from reporters.

Mr. Palij has 30 days to appeal before he is sent to Ukraine.

Andrew Lastowecky, who identified himself as being "very close" to the family, told The Weekly that "they are examining the possibilities of appeal, but the appeal doesn't do anything anyway. In the end it amounts to doing nothing for the case. It becomes costly."

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Earlier, in the U.S. government's case against John Demjanjuk of Seven Hills, Ohio, a federal appeals court on April 30 upheld a judge's decision to strip Mr. Demjanjuk of his U.S. citizenship, saying the government had proved he was a guard at a Nazi death-camp.

The three-judge panel of the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit said the government had provided "clear, unequivocal and convincing evidence" of Demjanjuk's guard service.

The Associated Press quoted the Justice Department as saying that it will begin what could be a years-long process to force Mr. Demjanjuk to leave the United States. The news service also noted: "Although it years ago abandoned an assertion that he was the notorious Ivan the Terrible at the Treblinka death camp in Poland, the Justice Department maintained that Demjanjuk had persecuted civilians during World War II at five Nazi concentration camps, including Trawniki, Sobibor and Flossenburg."

Back on February 21, 2002, Judge Paul Matia of the Federal District Court in Cleveland said that there was enough evidence to prove Mr. Demjanjuk was a guard at Nazi death and forced labor camps without eyewitness corroboration.

Mr. Demjanjuk's son-in-law Ed Nishnic, who acts as the family spokesman, said at the time: "It is true that judges have ruled against us over the past 25 years, and public opinion has seemed to be against us as well. Nevertheless, we have proven them wrong before and we have been vindicated. I am sure everybody will remember that Mr. Demjanjuk was wrongfully convicted, spent seven years in solitary confinement, and was sentenced to death by hanging due to an erroneous decision by a three-judge panel in Israel. They were wrong, and we were vindicated. We will appeal and will prove them wrong once again."

Mr. Demjanjuk, 81, whose case was initiated more than 25 years ago, has claimed that he served in the Soviet Army, was captured by German forces and was a prisoner of war. His case dates back to 1977, when he was first accused of being "Ivan the Terrible." A naturalized U.S. citizen, he lost that status in 1981, when a court stripped him of his citizenship. He was ordered deported and in 1986 was extradited to Israel, where a war crimes trial began a year later.

He was sentenced to death in 1988, but that conviction was overturned on appeal in 1993 by Israel's Supreme Court, and Mr. Demjanjuk returned home to Ohio. His citizenship was restored in 1998. In that 1998 ruling Judge Matia cited fraud on the part of U.S. government prosecutors and wrote that attorneys of the U.S. Justice Department's Office of Special Investigations (OSI) "acted with reckless disregard for their duty to the court and their discovery obligations" in failing to disclose potentially exculpatory evidence to the Demjanjuk defense.

The Justice Department filed suit again on May 19, 1999, seeking to once again revoke Mr. Demjanjuk's U.S. citizenship on the grounds that he illegally gained entry into the United States and illegally gained U.S. citizenship because he had concealed his service as a camp guard.

After the latest setback in the case, Mr. Demjanjuk's family told the Associated Press that his age and deteriorating health would make it difficult for him to withstand the deportation process. "He's slipping. He's not well," said Mr. Nishnic. Their options now include asking the full appeals court to reconsider the ruling or asking the Supreme Court to hear the case, Mr. Nishnic told the AP.

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