Accused Nazi Guard Loses A Bid To Stop Deportation

Accused Nazi death camp guard John Demjanjuk on Thursday lost a bid for the U.S. Supreme Court to stop his deportation to Germany, where he faces charges in the deaths of 29,000 Jews.
U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens rejected a request from the 89-year-old retired Ohio autoworker for a stay of deportation while Demjanjuk pursues his legal appeals.It was not known what other legal steps Demjanjuk's lawyer might take to try to stop the deportation, the subject of a legal battle battle with the U.S. Justice Department that has lasted decades. His lawyer could ask another Supreme Court justice for a stay.A Justice Department spokeswoman said the U.S. government will continue to work in cooperation with Germany to carry out the deportation but declined to provide details "on any possible timing of a potential removal."A U.S. appeals court in Ohio had cleared the way on May 1 for Demjanjuk's deportation, lifting a stay that had halted his removal at the last minute two weeks earlier after U.S. agents had taken him from his suburban Cleveland home in a wheelchair.Prosecutors in Munich, Germany have issued an arrest warrant to put the Ukraine-born Demjanjuk on trial for assisting in the deaths of 29,000 Jews at the Sobibor extermination camp during World War Two.The appeals court said the argument that sending Demjanjuk to Germany amounted to torture was unlikely to succeed and lifted the stay that had prevented his deportation.In seeking a stay of deportation from the Supreme Court, Demjanjuk's lawyer said his client suffered from "a number of physical ailments that present real and immediate risks to his life."Demjanjuk denies any role in the Holocaust and claims he was drafted into the Russian army in 1941, became a German prisoner of war a year later and served at German prison camps until 1944.

'Nazi Guard' Deportation Blocked

WASHINGTON, DC -- A US judge has blocked an order to deport an alleged Nazi concentration camp guard, two days before he was due to be extradited to Germany.
John Demjanjuk, 89, is accused of involvement in the deaths of 29,000 Jews at a camp in Nazi-occupied Poland.He denies any involvement and has asked for asylum in the US, arguing that deportation would constitute torture.An immigration judge said the block would stay until a decision had been reached on whether to re-open his case.Lawyers for Mr Demjanjuk say his health is far too poor for him to make the journey.In March, Germany issued an arrest warrant for the Ukraine national over the deaths of thousands of Jews at the Sobibor camp during World War II.But Mr Demjanjuk, who migrated to the US in 1952, says he was a prisoner of war of the Nazis rather than a prison guard.In 1986, he was extradited to Israel and sentenced to death for war crimes, after being identified by witnesses as "Ivan the Terrible" - a notorious prison guard at the Treblinka camp.But the Israeli Supreme Court overturned his conviction, when new evidence emerged suggesting he was not the same guard.He returned to the US but was accused of lying on his immigration application about working for the Nazis.In 2002, a US immigration judge ruled that there was enough evidence to prove Mr Demjanjuk had been a guard at several Nazi death camps and stripped him of his citizenship.German authorities now say they have new evidence linking him to the crimes of which he has been accused.