View source for John Demjanjuk

{{short description|Ukrainian guard at Nazi death camps (1920–2012)}}
{{family name hatnote|Mykolaiovych|Demjanjuk|lang=Eastern Slavic}}
{{pp-extended|small=yes}}
{{use American English|date=December 2020}}
{{use dmy dates|date=October 2024}}
{{Infobox criminal
| name              = John Demjanjuk
| image             = John Demjanjuk photo.jpg
| caption           = Demjanjuk in his [[Trawniki men|Trawniki]] card, 1940s
| native_name_lang  = uk
| native_name       = Джон Дем'янюк
| birth_name        = Ivan Mykolaiovych Demjanjuk
| birth_date        = {{Birth date|df=yes|1920|4|3}}
| birth_place       = {{ill|v=ib|Dubovi Makharyntsi|uk|Дубові Махаринці}}, [[Kiev Governorate]], Soviet&nbsp;Ukraine
| death_date        = {{death date and age|df=yes|2012|3|17|1920|4|3}}
| death_place       = [[Bad Feilnbach]], Germany
| citizenship       = {{ubl|[[Soviet Ukraine]] (until 1922)|[[Soviet Union]] (1922–?)|United States (1958–1981, 1998–2002)|Ukraine (from 1991)}}
| occupation        = Autoworker
| criminal penalty  = '''Israel'''{{ubl|[[Capital punishment in Israel|Death]] (overturned)}} '''Germany''' {{ubl|5 years imprisonment (not final)}}
| children          = 3
| spouse            = Vera Kowlowa<ref>{{cite web |url=http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2012/03/seven_hills_john_demjanjuk_con.html |title=Seven Hills' John Demjanjuk, convicted Nazi guard, dies in Bavaria at 91 |website=  Cleveland.com |date=17 March 2012 |access-date=21 December 2016}}</ref>
| module            = {{Infobox military person  |embed=yes
| branch = {{ubl|[[Red Army]] | ''[[Schutzstaffel]]''}}
| units = 
| allegiance = {{ubl|Soviet Union | [[Nazi Germany|Germany]]}}
}}
| conviction        = '''Israel''' (overturned) {{ubl|[[War crime]]s|[[Crimes against humanity]]|[[The Holocaust|Crimes against the Jewish people]]}} '''Germany''' (not final) {{ubl|[[Accessory to murder]] (28,060 counts)}}
| criminal_status   = Deceased
}}

'''John Demjanjuk''' ({{Langx|uk|Джон Дем'янюк}}), born '''Ivan Mykolaiovych Demjanjuk''' ({{Langx|uk|Іван Миколайович Дем'янюк}}), was a [[Trawniki man|Trawniki]] and [[Nazi camp guard]] at [[Sobibor extermination camp]], [[Majdanek]], and [[Flossenbürg]].{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=124|ps=. "As the Sydnor/Huebner report had made clear, the evidence of Demjanjuk's service at Majdanek and Flossenbürg was actually more detailed than the material about his time at Sobibor. This is not to suggest that Demjanjuk's time at Sobibor can be subject to reasonable doubt; Demjanjuk's service as a Sobibor Wachmann remains irrefutable, particularly when triangulated with the evidence of his service at Majdanek and Flossenbürg. The point is that the Majdanek and Flossenbürg deployments are better documented, as they include details such as Demjanjuk's punishment for indulging his appetite for 'salt and onions' during a typhus lockdown at Majdanek, and the serial numbers of his rifle and bayonet at Flossenbürg."}} Demjanjuk became the center of global media attention in the 1980s, when he was tried and convicted in Israel after being identified as "[[Ivan the Terrible (Treblinka guard)|Ivan the Terrible]]", a notoriously cruel watchman at [[Treblinka extermination camp]]. Demjanjuk was sentenced to death by hanging in 1988. In 1993, the verdict was overturned. Shortly before his death, he was tried and convicted in the Federal Republic of Germany as an accessory to the 28,060 murders that occurred during his service at Sobibor.

Born in [[Soviet Ukraine]], Demjanjuk was conscripted into the [[Red Army]] in 1940. He fought in World War II and was taken prisoner by the Germans in spring 1942, becoming a Trawniki [[Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy|collaborator]]. After training, he served at Sobibor extermination camp and at least two concentration camps. After the war, he married a woman he met in a West German displaced persons camp, and emigrated with her and their daughter to the United States.<ref name="Sturcke">{{cite web |first=James |last=Sturcke |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/may/12/ivan-demjanjuk-timeline |title=Timeline: John Demjanjuk |newspaper=The Guardian |date=12 May 2009 |access-date=21 January 2012}}</ref> They settled in [[Seven Hills, Ohio]], where he worked in an auto factory and raised three children. Demjanjuk became a US citizen in 1958.

In 1977, Demjanjuk was accused of war crimes. Based on [[eyewitness testimony]] by [[Holocaust survivors]] in Israel, he was identified as the notorious Ivan the Terrible from Treblinka.<ref name="Ynetnews12">{{cite news |url=https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4204048,00.html |title=Israeli judge: Demjanjuk was 'Ivan the Terrible' |work=Ynetnews Magazine |date=17 March 2012 |access-date=26 March 2014 |first=Boaz |last=Fyler }}</ref> Demjanjuk was extradited to Israel in 1986 for trial.<ref>{{cite journal |last= Fung |first= Annie |date=1993 |title= The Extradition of John Demjanjuk as 'Ivan the terrible'|url= https://digitalcommons.nyls.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1371&context=journal_of_international_and_comparative_law|journal= NYLS Journal of International and Comparative Law|volume= 14|issue= 2|pages= 471–502 |access-date= 24 July 2024}}</ref> In 1988, Demjanjuk was convicted and sentenced to death. He maintained his innocence, claiming that it was a case of [[mistaken identity]]. In 1993, the verdict was overturned by the [[Israeli Supreme Court]], based on new evidence that cast [[reasonable doubt]] over his identity as Ivan the Terrible.<ref>{{cite news |last=Hedges |first=Chris |date=12 August 1993 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/08/12/world/israel-recommends-that-demjanjuk-be-released.html |title=Israel recommends that Demjanjuk be released |newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Although the judges agreed there was sufficient evidence to show that Demjanjuk had served at Sobibor, Israel declined to prosecute. In September 1993, Demjanjuk was allowed to return to Ohio. In 1999, US prosecutors again sought to deport Demjanjuk for having been a concentration camp guard, and his citizenship was revoked in 2002.<ref name="Sturcke"/> In 2009, Germany requested his extradition for over 27,900 counts of acting as an [[accessory to murder]], one for each person killed at Sobibor during the time when he was alleged to have served there as a guard.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,624243,00.html |title=Demjanjuk Lands in Munich |work=Der Spiegel |date= 9 December 2009 |first1=Sebastian |last1=Fischer |first2=Conny |last2=Neumann |location=Munich and Cleveland |first3=Cordula |last3= Meyer |access-date=28 March 2017}}</ref> He was deported from the US to Germany in that same year.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/05/11/Demjanjuk-leaves-home-in-ambulance/UPI-58871242072603/ |title=Demjanjuk en route to Germany |work=United Press International |date=11 May 2009}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Kulish|first= Nicholas |date=12 May 2009 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/13/world/europe/13german.html |title=Accused Nazi arrives in Munich |newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> In 2011, he was convicted and sentenced to five years in prison.

According to legal scholar [[Lawrence Douglas]], in spite of serious missteps along the way, the German verdict brought the case "to a worthy and just conclusion".{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=256|ps=: "In Arendt's terms, the Demjanjuk trial succeeded at correcting the 'pernicious ... to a worthy and just conclusion'."}} After the conviction, Demjanjuk was released pending appeal. He lived at a German nursing home in [[Bad Feilnbach]],<ref name=stateless1>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/14/world/europe/14nazi.html |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |first1=Jack |last1=Ewing |first2=Alan |last2=Cowell |title=Demjanjuk taken to nursing home |date=13 May 2011|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> where he died in 2012.<ref>{{cite news |last=McFadden |first=Robert |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |date=17 March 2012 |title=John Demjanjuk, 91, dogged by charges of atrocities as Nazi camp guard, dies |url= https://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/18/world/europe/john-demjanjuk-nazi-guard-dies-at-91.html |access-date=28 March 2017}}</ref> Having died before a final judgment on his appeal could be issued, Demjanjuk remains technically innocent under German law.<ref name="Aderet 2012">{{cite news |last=Aderet |first=Ofer |date=23 May 2012|title=Convicted Nazi Criminal Demjanjuk Deemed Innocent in Germany Over Technicality |url=https://www.haaretz.com/1.5202160 |newspaper=[[Haaretz]] |access-date=20 November 2019}}</ref> In 2020, [[Sobibor perpetrator album|a photograph album]] by Sobibor guard [[Johann Niemann]] was made public; some historians have suggested that a guard who appears in two photos may have been Demjanjuk.
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==Background==
<!-- Early life and World War II -->Demjanjuk was born in Dubovi Makharyntsi (formerly [[Kiev Governorate]], presently [[Koziatyn]] district, [[Vinnytsia Oblast]]), a farming village in the western part of [[Soviet Ukraine]]. His boyhood coincided with the [[Holodomor]] famine,<ref>{{cite magazine |last=Raab|first= Scott |date=19 March 2012 |url=http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/john-demjanjuk-dead-7455239#ixzz1t9fc3eo6 |title=John Demjanjuk: Things we are left to tend to think |magazine=Esquire |access-date=25 April 2012}}</ref><ref name=Telegraph>{{cite news |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/9150184/Nazi-war-criminal-John-Demjanjuk-dies-aged-91.html |title=Nazi war criminal John Demjanjuk dies aged 91 |newspaper=[[The Daily Telegraph]] |department=Obituary |date=17 March 2012|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> and he later worked as a tractor driver in a [[Collectivization in the Soviet Union|Soviet collective farm]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.thelocal.de/society/20091220-24059.html |title=Anger simmers in Demjanjuk's home village |website=[[The Local]] |date=20 December 2009|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> In 1940, he was drafted into the [[Red Army]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://pamyat-naroda.ru/heroes/memorial-chelovek_dopolnitelnoe_donesenie69831870/|script-title=ru:Демянюк Иван Николаевич <!-- :: Память народа -->|title=Demânûk Ivan Nikolaevič <!-- :: Pamât' naroda -->|website=Pamyat naroda|language=ru|date=2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241130160608/https://pamyat-naroda.ru/heroes/memorial-chelovek_dopolnitelnoe_donesenie69831870/|archive-date=30 November 2024|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> After a battle in eastern [[Crimea]], he was taken prisoner by the Germans and was held in a camp for Soviet prisoners of war in [[Chełm]].<ref>{{cite news |title=John Demjanjuk |series=Profile |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7998947.stm |access-date=12 May 2011 |work=BBC News |date=30 November 2009}}</ref> According to German records, Demjanjuk most likely arrived at [[Trawniki concentration camp]] to be trained as a camp guard for the Nazis on 13 June 1942. He was assigned to a manorial estate called Okzów on 22 September 1942, but returned to Trawniki on 14 October. He was transferred to [[Majdanek concentration camp]], where he was disciplined on 18 January 1943. He was sent back to Trawniki and on 26 March 1943 he was assigned to [[Sobibor concentration camp]]. On 1 October 1943, he was transferred to [[Flossenbürg concentration camp|Flossenbürg]], where he served until at least 10 December 1944.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=127–130}}

<!-- Investigation -->Demjanjuk later claimed to have been drafted into the [[Russian Liberation Army]] in 1944; however, an investigation conducted in the 1990s by the US [[Office of Special Investigations (United States Department of Justice)|Office of Special Investigations]] (OSI) found this to be a cover story.<ref name="auto">{{cite book |last=Nagorski |first=Andrew |title=The Nazi Hunters |publisher=Simon and Schuster |year=2016 |page=313|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9VAJCgAAQBAJ&q=Demjanjuk|isbn=9781476771885 }}</ref> OSI was unable to establish Demjanjuk's whereabouts from December 1944 to the end of the war.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=51}} After the end of the war, Demjanjuk spent time in several [[displaced person]]s (DP) camps in Germany. Initially, Demjanjuk hoped to emigrate to [[Nazi fugitives in Argentina|Argentina]] or [[War criminals in Canada|Canada]]; however, under the [[Displaced Persons Act of 1948]], he applied to move to the United States.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=28–29}} His application stated that he had worked as a driver in the town of [[Sobibór (village)|Sobibór]] in eastern Poland; the nearby Sobibor extermination camp was named after the village.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://jcpa.org/article/looking-back-on-the-demjanjuk-trial-in-munich/|title=Looking Back on the Demjanjuk Trial in Munich|last=Houwink ten Cate|first=Johannes|date=1 March 2012|publisher=Jerusalem Centre for Public Affairs|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Demjanjuk later claimed this was a coincidence, and said that he picked the name Sobibor from an atlas owned by a fellow applicant because it had a large Soviet population.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The German Trauma: Experiences and Reflections, 1938–2001|last=Sereny|first= Gitta|isbn=0140292632|location=London|oclc=59530429|date = 6 September 2001}}</ref> Historian Hans-Jürgen Bömelburg observed in regard to Demjanjuk that [[Nazi war criminals]] sometimes tried to evade prosecution after the war by presenting themselves as victims of Nazi persecution rather than as the perpetrators.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25368834-2703,00.html|title=Demjanjuk posed as a Nazi camp victim|date=22 April 2009|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090425191412/http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25368834-2703,00.html|archive-date=25 April 2009|access-date=22 April 2009|newspaper=[[The Australian]]}}</ref>

<!-- In the US -->Demjanjuk found a job as a driver in a [[Displaced persons camps in post-World War II Europe|displaced persons camp]] in the Bavarian city of [[Landshut]], and was subsequently transferred to camps in other southern German cities, until ending up in [[Feldafing]] near [[Munich]] in May 1951.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/delayed-justice-sixty-years-later-alleged-nazi-guard-may-stand-trial-a-591257.html|title=Sixty years later, alleged Nazi guard may stand trial|last1=Rosenbach|first1=Marcel|date=18 November 2008|work=[[Der Spiegel]]|last2=Friedmann|first2=Jan|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-13345166|title=John Demjanjuk|date=17 March 2012|work=BBC News|department=Obituary|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> There he met Vera Kowlowa, another DP, and they married.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/convicted-nazi-criminal-john-demjanjuk-dies-at-92/2010/09/21/gIQAcKhQIS_story.html|title=Convicted Nazi criminal John Demjanjuk dies at 91|first1=Joe|last1=Holley|first2=Adam|last2=Bernstein|date=17 March 2012|newspaper=The Washington Post|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Demjanjuk, his wife and daughter arrived in New York City aboard the {{USS|General W. G. Haan|AP-158|6}} on 9 February 1952.<ref name="rosen">{{cite news|url=http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,591257,00.html|title=Sixty years later, alleged Nazi guard may stand trial|last=Rosenbach|first=Marcel|date=18 November 2008|work=[[Der Spiegel]]|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>{{sfn|Douglas|2016}}{{page needed|date=January 2023}} They moved to [[Indiana]], and later settled in the [[Cleveland]] suburb of [[Seven Hills, Ohio]]. There he became a [[United Auto Workers]] (UAW) diesel engine [[Auto mechanic|mechanic]] at the nearby [[Ford Motor Company|Ford]] automobile factory,<ref name="ClevelandJewishNews22032012"/> where a friend from [[Regensburg]] had found work.{{sfn|Douglas|2016}}{{page needed|date=January 2023}} His wife found work at a [[General Electric]] facility,{{sfn|Douglas|2016}}{{page needed|date=January 2023}} and the two had two more children. On 14 November 1958, Demjanjuk became a [[naturalized citizen]] of the United States and legally changed his name from Ivan to John.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=29}}

==Loss of US citizenship and extradition to Israel==
===Investigation by INS and OSI===
In 1975, Michael Hanusiak, the American editor of ''[[Ukrainian News]]'', presented US Senator [[Jacob Javits]] of New York with a list of 70 ethnic Ukrainians living in the United States who were suspected of having collaborated with Germans in World War II; Javits sent the list to [[US Immigration and Naturalization Service]] (INS). Its investigation reduced the list to nine individuals, including Demjanjuk.<ref name="Pyle">{{cite book |last1=Pyle |first1=Christopher |author-link1 =  Christopher Pyle |title=Extradition Politics & Human Rights |date=2001 |publisher=Temple University Press |page=238 |isbn = 978-1566398237 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8iEWsWUjHA8C&q=%22Michael+Hanusiak%22+john+demjanjuk&pg=PA238}}</ref>{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=30–34}} Hanusiak claimed that Soviet newspapers and archives had provided the names during his visit to [[Kyiv]] in 1974; however, INS suspected that Hanusiak, a member of the [[Communist Party USA]], had received the list from the [[KGB]]. It chose to investigate the names as leads.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|pp=108–110}} Hanusiak claimed that Demjanjuk had been a guard at Sobibor concentration and death camp.<ref name="Pyle"/> INS quickly discovered that Demjanjuk had listed his place of domicile from 1937 to 1943 as Sobibor on his US visa application of 1951. This was considered circumstantial corroboration of Hanusiak's claims, but its agents were unable to find witnesses in the US who could identify Demjanjuk.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=34–35}}

INS sent photographs to the Israeli government of the nine persons alleged by Hanusiak to have been involved in crimes against Jews: the government's agents asked survivors of Sobibor and Treblinka if they could identify Demjanjuk based on his visa application picture. While none recognized the name Ivan Demjanjuk, and no survivors of Sobibor identified his photograph, nine survivors of Treblinka identified Demjanjuk as "[[Ivan the Terrible (Treblinka guard)|Ivan the Terrible]]", so named because of his cruelty as a guard operating the gas chamber at Treblinka.<ref name="Pyle"/>{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=37–38}} Lawyers at the US [[Office of Special Investigations (United States Department of Justice)|Office of Special Investigations]] (OSI) in the Department of Justice valued the identifications made by these survivors, as they had interacted with and seen "Ivan the Terrible" over a protracted period of time. They also gained an additional identification of the visa photo as Demjanjuk by Otto Horn, a former [[SS]] guard at Treblinka.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=51}}

In August 1977, the Justice Department submitted a request to the [[US District Court for the Northern District of Ohio]] to revoke Demjanjuk's citizenship, based on his concealment on his 1951 immigration application of having worked at Nazi death camps.<ref name="New York Times">{{cite news| url=https://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/24/us/judge-rules-autoworker-must-lose-us-citizenship-for-falsifying-past.html |title=Judge Rules Autoworker Must Lose Citizenship for Falsifying Past |work=The New York Times|date=22 June 1981}}</ref> While the government was preparing for trial, Hanusiak published pictures of an ID card identifying Demjanjuk as having been a [[Trawniki man]] and guard at Sobibor in ''News from Ukraine''.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|pp=129–139}} Given that eyewitnesses attested to Demjanjuk having been Ivan the Terrible at Treblinka decades before, whereas documentary evidence seemed to indicate that he had served at Sobibor with little notoriety, OSI considered dropping the proceeding against Demjanjuk to focus on higher profile cases. But OSI's new director [[Allan Ryan (attorney)|Allan Ryan]] chose to go ahead with the prosecution of Demjanjuk as Ivan the Terrible.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|pp=150–154}} In 1979, three guards from Sobibor gave sworn depositions that they knew Demjanjuk to have been a guard there, and two identified his photograph. OSI did not submit these depositions into evidence and took them as a further indication that Demjanjuk was Ivan the Terrible, though none of the guards mentioned Demjanjuk having been at Treblinka.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|pp=157–158}}

===Deportation and extradition proceedings===
The proceeding opened with the prosecution calling historian [[Earl F. Ziemke]], who reconstructed the situation on the [[Eastern Front (World War II)|Eastern Front]] in 1942 and showed that it would have been possible for Demjanjuk to have been captured at the Battle of Kerch and arrive in Trawniki that same year.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|pp=180–182}}
The authenticity of the Trawniki card was affirmed by US government experts who examined the original document as well as by [[Wolfgang Scheffler (historian)|Wolfgang Scheffler]] of the [[Free University of Berlin]] during the hearing,<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/13/us/nazi-deportation-trial-centers-on-identity-card.html |title=Nazi Deportation Trial Centers on Identity Card |work=The New York Times|date=13 February 1981|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=54}} Scheffler also testified to the crimes committed by Trawniki men and that it was possible that Demjanjuk had been moved between Sobibor and Treblinka.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|pp=182–185}} Additionally, the former paymaster at Trawniki, Heinrich Schaefer, stated in a deposition that such cards were standard issue at Trawniki.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=53–54}}{{sfn|Rashke|2013|pp=192–194}} Five [[Holocaust survivor]]s from Treblinka identified Demjanjuk as having been at Treblinka and having been "Ivan the Terrible".{{sfn|Rashke|2013|p=199}} Additionally, OSI submitted the testimony of former SS guard Horn identifying Demjanjuk as having been at Treblinka.<ref name="Temple University Press">{{cite book |last1=Pyle |first1=Christopher |author-link1 =  Christopher Pyle |title=Extradition Politics & Human Rights |date=2001 |publisher=Temple University Press |page=242 |isbn = 978-1566398237 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8iEWsWUjHA8C&q=%22Michael+Hanusiak%22+john+demjanjuk&pg=PA238|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>

Although Demjanjuk's Trawniki card only documented that he had been at Sobibor, the prosecution argued that he could have shuttled between the camps and that Treblinka had been omitted due to administrative sloppiness.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=54}} During the trial, Demjanjuk admitted to having lied on his US visa application but claimed that it was out of fear of being returned to the Soviet Union and denied having been a concentration camp guard. Demjanjuk instead claimed to have been a German prisoner who completed forced labor.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1981/03/05/us/alleged-nazi-admits-lying-for-visa.html |title=Alleged Nazi Admits Lying for Visa |work=The New York Times |date=5 March 1981|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> The defense also submitted the statement of [[Feodor Fedorenko]], a Ukrainian guard at Treblinka, which stated that Fedorenko could not recall having seen Demjanjuk at Treblinka.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1981/03/11/us/around-the-nation-defense-rests-in-trial-of-alleged-nazi-guard.html |title=Defense Rests in Trial of Alleged Nazi Guard |work=The New York Times|date=11 March 1981|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Demjanjuk's citizenship was revoked in 1981 for having lied about his past,<ref name="New York Times"/> with the judge persuaded especially by the testimony of Otto Horn.<ref name="Temple University Press"/> In 1982, Demjanjuk was jailed for 10 days after failing to appear for a hearing. Demjanjuk subsequently requested political asylum in the United States rather than deportation. His application for asylum was denied on 31 May 1984.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1984/05/31/us/around-the-nation-ex-nazi-suspect-loses-immigration-court-case.html |title=Ex-Nazi Suspect Loses Immigration Court Case |work=The New York Times|date=31 May 1984|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>

Demjanjuk's defense was supported by the Ukrainian community and various [[Eastern European]] émigré groups; Demjanjuk's supporters alleged that he was the victim of a communist conspiracy and raised over two million dollars for his defense.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Pyle |first1=Christopher |author-link1 =  Christopher Pyle |title=Extradition Politics & Human Rights |date=2001 |publisher=Temple University Press |page=248 |isbn = 978-1566398237 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8iEWsWUjHA8C&q=%22Michael+Hanusiak%22+john+demjanjuk&pg=PA238|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Much of the money was raised by a Cleveland-based [[Holocaust denier]] Jerome Brentar, who also recommended Demjanjuk's lawyer Mark O'Connor.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=74–75}} The first day of the [[denaturalization]] trial was accompanied by a protest of 150 Ukrainian-Americans who called the trial "a Soviet trial in an American court" and burned a Soviet flag.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=57}} Demjanjuk also attracted the support of conservative political figures such as [[Pat Buchanan]] and Ohio congressman [[James Traficant]].{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=58}} Others, particularly American Jews, were outraged by the presence of Demjanjuk in the United States and vocally supported his deportation.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=59}} Writer Lawrence Douglas has called the case "the most highly publicized denaturalization proceeding in American history."{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=2}}

In October 1983, Israel issued an [[extradition]] request for Demjanjuk to stand trial on Israeli soil under the [[Nazis and Nazi Collaborators (Punishment) Law]] of 1950 for crimes allegedly committed at Treblinka.<ref name="EXTRADITION DUE IN WAR CRIME CASE">{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1986/02/24/us/extradition-due-in-war-crime-case.html |title=Extradition Due in War Crime Case |work=The New York Times|date=24 February 1986}}</ref> In April 1985, he was detained and held at [[United States Medical Center for Federal Prisoners]] in [[Springfield, Missouri]].<ref>{{cite news |date=16 April 1985 |title=Man's Extradition to Israel Ordered |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1985/04/16/us/man-s-extradition-to-israel-ordered.html |access-date=8 February 2023 |issn=0362-4331}}</ref> Demjanjuk appealed his extradition; in a hearing on 8 July 1985, Demjanjuk's defense attorneys claimed that the evidence against him had been manufactured by the [[KGB]],<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1985/11/22/us/man-accused-of-nazi-crimes-is-to-be-extradited-to-israel.html |title=Man Accused of Nazi Crimes to be Extradited to Israel |work=The New York Times|date=22 November 1985|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> that Demjanjuk was never at Treblinka, and that the court had no authority to consider Israel's request for extradition.<ref name="EXTRADITION DUE IN WAR CRIME CASE"/> The appeals court found [[probable cause]] that Demjanjuk "committed murders of uncounted numbers of prisoners" and allowed the extradition to take place.<ref name="EXTRADITION DUE IN WAR CRIME CASE"/> The United States Supreme Court declined to hear Demjanjuk's appeal on 25 February 1986, allowing the extradition to move forward.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1986/02/25/us/court-clears-way-for-extradition.html |title=Court Clears Way for Extradition|work=The New York Times|date=25 February 1986}}</ref> Demjanjuk was deported to Israel on 28 February 1986.<ref name=BBC>{{cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/july/29/newsid_4561000/4561917.stm |title=Israeli court sets Demjanjuk free |work=BBC News |date=29 July 1993|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>

==Trial in Israel==
[[File:Trial of John Demjanjuk in Jerusalem, 1986 Dan Hadani Archive.jpg|thumb|Demjanjuk trial opens at the [[Jerusalem District Court]] on 26 November 1986]]
[[File:Flickr - Government Press Office (GPO) - SUPREME COURT JUSTICE DOV LEVIN DISTRICT AND COURT JUDGE DALIA DORNER LOOKING AT A PHOTO ALBUM DURING THE TRIAL OF JOHN (IVAN) DEMJANJUK.jpg|thumb|Judges [[Dov Levin]] and [[Dalia Dorner]] review evidence during the trial, 23 February 1987]]

Demjanjuk's trial took place in the [[Jerusalem District Court]] between 26 November 1986 and 18 April 1988, before a special tribunal comprising [[Supreme Court of Israel|Israeli Supreme Court]] Judge [[Dov Levin]] and Jerusalem District Court Judges [[Zvi Tal]] and [[Dalia Dorner]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Anti-Semitism%20and%20the%20Holocaust/Documents%20and%20communiques/THE%20DEMJANJUK%20CASE-%20FACTUAL%20AND%20LEGAL%20DETAILS%20-%2028 |title=The Demjanjuk case |quote=John was in trial for accessory to murder charges. |publisher=Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs |date=28 July 1993|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> The prosecution conceived of the trial as a didactic trial on the Holocaust in the manner of the earlier [[trial of Adolf Eichmann]]. It was the first televised trial in Israeli history.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=68–74}} Despite initially attracting minimal attention, once survivor testimony began the trial became a "national obsession" and was followed widely throughout Israel and the United States.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=79}} On 6 April 1987, John Stolz (or Stoltz), a 65-year-old German SS officer who had worked at a concentration camp in Poland, hanged himself in his basement in Ohio after receiving a letter from the OSI. His son Edwin said he'd been terrified of being put through the same ordeal as Demjanjuk.<ref>{{cite news |last=Gast|first=Dorothy|date=9 April 1987|title=Former SS Officer Hanged Self to Avoid Demjanjuk Scenario, Son Says |url=https://apnews.com/article/5350f9d2b3094fc9c3cc11fd4a61cf31 |url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230509020422/https://apnews.com/article/5350f9d2b3094fc9c3cc11fd4a61cf31|archive-date=9 May 2023|access-date=9 May 2023 |work=Associated Press News }}</ref>

===Prosecution case===
The prosecution team consisted of Israeli State Attorney Yonah Blatman, lead attorney Michael Shaked of the Jerusalem District Attorney's Office, and the attorneys Michael Horovitz and Dennis Gouldman of the International Section of the State Attorney's Office.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|p=272|ps=: "The prosecution team sat on the right—state attorney Yonah Blatman, lead attorney Michael Shaked, and attorneys Michael Horovitz and Dennis Gouldman."}} According to prosecutors, Demjanjuk had been recruited into the Soviet army in 1940, and had fought until he was captured by German troops in eastern [[Crimea]] in May 1942. He was then brought to a German prisoner of war camp in Chełm in July 1942. Prosecutors claimed that Demjanjuk volunteered to collaborate with the Germans and was sent to the camp at [[Trawniki]], where he was trained to guard prisoners as part of [[Operation Reinhard]]. The principal allegation was that three former prisoners identified Demjanjuk as "Ivan the Terrible" of Treblinka, who operated the petrol engines sending gas to the death chamber.<ref name = "US Holocaust Museum"/> The prosecution alleged that Demjanjuk had listed Sobibor on his US immigration application in an attempt to cover up his presence at Treblinka.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=89–90}}

Prosecutors based part of these allegations on an ID&nbsp;card referred to as the "Trawniki card". Because the Soviet Union generally refused to cooperate with the Israeli prosecutions, this ID&nbsp;card was obtained from the [[USSR]] and provided to Israel by American industrialist [[Armand Hammer]], a close associate of several Kremlin leaders, whose help had been requested by the personal appeal of Israeli president [[Shimon Peres]].<ref>{{cite news |agency=United Press International |date=6 March 1987 |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-03-06-mn-4999-story.html |title=Demjanjuk quoted: Guards only followed orders |work=[[Los Angeles Times]] |location=Jerusalem |access-date=28 March 2017}}</ref>{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=92}} The defense claimed that the card was forged by Soviet authorities to discredit Demjanjuk.{{Sfn|Kudryashov|2004|p=228}} The card had Demjanjuk's photograph, which he identified as his picture at the time. The prosecution called expert witnesses to testify on the authenticity of the card including its signatures by various Nazi officers, paper, and ink. The defense used some evidence supplied by the Soviets to support their case while calling other pieces of evidence supplied by the Soviets "forgeries".<ref name=Nizkor_trial>{{cite web |date=2000|url=http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/people/d/demjanjuk-john/israeli-data/demjanjuk-s1-2.html |title=The Demjanjuk Case: The trial |publisher=[[Nizkor Project]] |access-date=11 January 2008 |archive-date=18 September 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070918023752/http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/people/d/demjanjuk-john/israeli-data/demjanjuk-s1-2.html |url-status=dead }}</ref>

The prosecution relied heavily on the testimony of Holocaust survivors to establish that Demjanjuk had been at Treblinka, five of whom were put on the stand.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=79–80}}<ref name = "Pile 251">{{cite book |last=Pyle|first= Christopher H. |year=2001 |title=Extradition, Politics, and Human Rights |publisher=Temple University Press |isbn=1-56639-823-1 |chapter=19. Ivan who? Getting the wrong man |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=8iEWsWUjHA8C&&pg=PA251 251] |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8iEWsWUjHA8C&q=Ivan+who%3F+Getting+the+wrong+man+rosenberg&pg=PA251|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Four of the survivors who had originally identified Demjanjuk's photograph had died before the trial began.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=78}} The testimony of one of these witnesses, Pinhas Epstein, had been barred as unreliable in US denaturalization trial of former camp guard Feodor Fedorenko,<ref name = "Pile 251"/> while another, Gustav Boraks, sometimes appeared confused on the stand.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=91}} The most important of these was Eliyahu Rosenberg.<ref name = "Pile 251"/> Asked by the prosecution if he recognized Demjanjuk, Rosenberg asked that the defendant remove his glasses "so I can see his eyes".<ref name="Broder 1987">{{cite news |last=Broder|first= Jonathan |date=26 February 1987 |url=https://www.chicagotribune.com/1987/02/26/2d-witness-calls-demjanjuk-ivan-the-terrible/ |title=2nd witness calls Demjanjuk 'Ivan the Terrible' |newspaper=Chicago Tribune|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Rosenberg approached and peered closely at Demjanjuk's face. When Demjanjuk smiled and offered his hand, Rosenberg recoiled and shouted "Grozny!", meaning "Terrible" in Polish and Russian. Rosenberg stated: "Ivan, I say it unhesitatingly, without the slightest shadow of a doubt. It is Ivan from Treblinka, from the gas chambers, the man I am looking at now."<ref name="Broder 1987"/> Rosenberg further told the court, glaring at Demjanjuk, "I saw his eyes, I saw those murderous eyes."<ref name="Broder 1987"/> Rosenberg then exclaimed directly to Demjanjuk: "How dare you put out your hand, murderer that you are!"<ref name="Broder 1987"/> It was later learned that Rosenberg had previously testified in a 1947 deposition that "Ivan the Terrible" had been killed in 1943 during a [[Treblinka prisoner uprising]].<ref name="Pile 251"/> During the trial, Demjanjuk was again identified on the photo spread by Otto Horn, a former German SS guard at Treblinka.<ref name=Nizkor_trial/>

Other controversial evidence included Demjanjuk's tattoo. Demjanjuk admitted the scar under his armpit was an [[SS blood group tattoo]], which he removed after the war, as did many SS men to avoid [[summary execution]] by the Soviets. The blood group tattoo was applied by army medics and used by combat personnel in the [[Waffen-SS]] and [[Waffen-SS foreign volunteers and conscripts|its foreign volunteers and conscripts]] because they were likely to need blood or give transfusions. There is no evidence that POWs trained as police auxiliaries at Trawniki were required to receive such tattoos, although it was an option for those that volunteered.<ref name = "US Holocaust Museum">{{cite web|date=2011|url=http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007956|url-status=dead|title=John Demjanjuk: Prosecution of a Nazi collaborator|publisher=United States Holocaust Memorial Museum|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110406103418/http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007956|archive-date=6 April 2011|access-date=23 April 2012}}</ref>

===Defense case and Demjanjuk's testimony===
[[File:Trial of John Demjanjuk in Jerusalem, 1987 Dan Hadani Archive.jpg|thumb|Demjanjuk speaking with his attorney Mark O'Connor on 16 February 1987]]

Demjanjuk was at first represented by attorney Mark J. O'Connor of [[New York State]]; Demjanjuk fired him in July 1987 just a week before he was scheduled to testify at his trial. In his place, Demjanjuk hired Israeli trial lawyer {{ill|Yoram Sheftel|he|יורם_שפטל}} whom O'Connor had hired as co-counsel. Sheftel focused the defense largely on the claim that Demjanjuk's Trawniki card was a KGB forgery.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=83}} Most significantly, Sheftel called Dr. [[Julius Grant]], who had proven that the [[Hitler diaries]] were forged. Grant testified that the document had been forged.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|pp=400–402}} He also called Dutch psychologist [[Willem Albert Wagenaar]], who testified to flaws in the method by which Treblinka survivors had identified Demjanjuk as Ivan the Terrible.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|pp=414–422}} Additionally, Sheftel alleged that the trial was a [[show trial]], and referred to the trial as "the Demjanjuk affair", alluding to the famous antisemitic [[Dreyfus Affair]].{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=83–84}}

Demjanjuk testified during the trial that he was imprisoned in a camp in Chełm until 1944, when he was transferred to another camp in Austria, where he remained until he joined an anti-Soviet Ukrainian army group. Demjanjuk had not mentioned Chelm in his initial depositions in the United States, first referring to Chelm during his denaturalization trial in 1981. As Chelm was Demjanjuk's alibi, he was questioned about this omission during the trial by both the prosecutors and the judges; Demjanjuk blamed the trauma of his POW experience and said he had simply forgotten.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=85–86}} Demjanjuk also denied having known how to drive a truck in 1943, despite having stated this on his application for refugee assistance in 1948; Demjanjuk alleged that he had not filled out the form himself and the clerk must have misunderstood him. Demjanjuk's denial related both to the supposed operation of a truck's diesel engine by "Ivan the Terrible" for the gas chamber at Treblinka and to the SS's singling out of Ukrainians with experience driving trucks as Trawniki men.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=86–88}} Demjanjuk changed his testimony as to why he had listed Sobibor as his place of domicile from his earlier trials; he now claimed to have been advised to do so by an official of the [[United Nations Relief Administration]] to list a place in Poland or Czechoslovakia in order to avoid repatriation to the Soviet Union, after which another Soviet refugee waiting with him suggested Demjanjuk list Sobibor. Demjanjuk also said, "Your Honors, if I had really been in that terrible place, would I have been stupid enough to say so?"{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=88–89}}

Demjanjuk further claimed that in 1944 he was drafted into an anti-Soviet Russian military organization, the [[Russian Liberation Army]] (Vlasov Army), funded by the Nazi German government, until the surrender of Nazi Germany to the [[Allies of World War II|Allies]] in 1945.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|pp=405–406}} Following closing statements, the defense submitted the statement of Ignat Danilchenko, information which had been obtained through the US [[Freedom of Information Act (United States)|Freedom of Information]] but had not previously been made available to the defense by OSI. Danilchenko was a former guard at Sobibor and had been deposed by the Soviet Union in 1979 at the request of the OSI (US Office of Special Investigations). Danilchenko identified Demjanjuk from three separate photo spreads as having been an "experienced and reliable" guard at Sobibor and that Demjanjuk had been transferred to Flossenbürg, where he had received an SS blood-type tattoo; Danilchenko did not mention Treblinka.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=91}} Through Baltic émigré supporters living in Washington, D.C., the defense was also able to acquire internal OSI notes that had been thrown in a dumpster without shredding that showed that Otto Horn had in fact had difficulty identifying Demjanjuk and had been prompted to make the identification.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=91}}

===Verdict and Israeli Supreme Court reversal===
On 18 April 1988, the Jerusalem District Court found Demjanjuk "unhesitatingly and with utter conviction" guilty of all charges and of being "Ivan the Terrible". One week later, it sentenced him to death by [[hanging]].<ref name=Sentence>{{Cite book |last=<!-- שיף --> Shif |first=Yehudah<!--  יהודה -->|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5YOgAAAAMAAJ |title=Israel 50 |date=1997 |publisher=Alfa Communication |isbn=978-965-474-005-0 |access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Demjanjuk was placed in [[solitary confinement]] during the appeals process.<ref name= Acquittal>{{cite news |last=Hedges |first=Chris |date=30 July 1993 |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE5D8103AF933A05754C0A965958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all |title=Acquittal in Jerusalem; Israel court sets Demjanjuk free, but he is now without a country |newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> While there, carpenters began building the gallows that would be used to hang him if his appeals were rejected, and Demjanjuk heard the construction from his cell.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.economist.com/obituary/2012/03/24/john-demjanjuk |newspaper=The Economist |department=Obituary |date=24 March 2012 |title=John Demjanjuk|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>

On 29 July 1993, a five-judge panel of the [[Israeli Supreme Court]] overturned the guilty verdict on appeal. The Supreme Court upheld the lower court's rulings on the authenticity of the Trawniki card and the falsity of Demjanjuk's alibi but ruled that reasonable doubt existed that Demjanjuk was Ivan the Terrible.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|pp=479–480}} The judges agreed that Demjanjuk most likely served as a Nazi ''Wachmann'' (guard) in the Trawniki unit,<ref name="Acquittal"/> and had been posted at Sobibor extermination camp and two other camps. Evidence to assist this claim included an identification card from Trawniki bearing Demjanjuk's picture and personal information,<ref name="Acquittal"/>⁠ which was found in the Soviet archives, in addition to German documents that mentioned "Wachmann" Demjanjuk with his date and place of birth.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=93–94}} The Trawniki certificate also implied that Demjanjuk had served at Sobibor, as did the German orders of March 1943 posting his Trawniki unit to the area.<ref name="Acquittal"/> The court declined to find him guilty on this basis because the prosecution had built its entire case around Demjanjuk's identity with Ivan the Terrible, and Demjanjuk had not been given a chance to defend himself from charges of being a guard at Sobibor.{{sfn|Rashke|2013|p=482}}

The judge's acquittal of Demjanjuk for being Ivan the Terrible was based on the written statements of 37&nbsp;former guards at Treblinka that identified Ivan the Terrible as "[[Ivan Marchenko]]".<ref name= "Acquittal"/> The former guards' statements were obtained after World War&nbsp;II by the Soviets, who prosecuted USSR citizens who had assisted the Nazis as auxiliary forces during the war. Most of the guards were executed after the war by the Soviets,{{Sfn|Kudryashov|2004|p=237}} and their written statements were not obtained by Israeli authorities until 1991, when the [[Soviet Union collapse]]d.<ref name="time 1993"/> Central to the new evidence was a photograph of Ivan the Terrible and a description that did not match the 1942 appearance of Demjanjuk. The accounts of 21 guards who were tried in the Soviet Union on war crimes gave details that differentiate Demjanjuk from Ivan the Terrible{{px2}}{{mdash}}{{hsp}}in particular that the surname of "Ivan the Terrible" was ''Marchenko'', not ''Demjanjuk''.<ref>{{cite news |last=Williams|first= Daniel |date=21 December 1991 |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-12-21-mn-608-story.html |title=KGB evidence reopens the case of 'Ivan the Terrible': Holocaust: Recently released files bolster the appeal of the man convicted as a Nazi death camp monster |newspaper=[[Los Angeles Times]] |access-date=23 April 2012}}</ref> One described Ivan the Terrible as having brown hair, hazel eyes and a large scar down to his neck; Demjanjuk was blond with grayish-blue eyes and no such scar. US officials had originally been aware, without informing Demjanjuk's attorneys, of the testimony of two of these German guards;<ref name="time 1993">{{cite magazine |last1=Beyer|first1= Lisa |last2=Johnson|first2= Julie |last3=Myers|first3= Ken |date=2 August 1993 |url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,978969,00.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081214220924/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,978969,00.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=14 December 2008 |title=Ivan the not-so-terrible |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|Time]]|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> however, the Israeli justices observed that Demjanjuk had incorrectly listed his mother's maiden name as ''Marchenko'' in his 1951 application for US visa.<ref name= "Acquittal"/> Demjanjuk said he just wrote a common Ukrainian surname after he forgot his mother's real name (''Tabachyk'').<ref name= "time 1993"/><ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/why-nazi-trials-must-end-the-story-behind-the-likely-acquittal-of-john-demjanjuk-provides-powerful-1541676.html|title=Why Nazi trials must end: The story behind the likely acquittal of|date=21 August 1992|work=The Independent|access-date=11 November 2019}}</ref>

===Post-acquittal===
Demjanjuk's acquittal was met with outrage in Israel, including threats against the justices' lives.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=96}} [[Simon Wiesenthal]], an iconic figure in [[Nazi-hunting]], first believed Demjanjuk was guilty; after Demjanjuk's acquittal by the Israeli Supreme Court, he said he also would have cleared him given the new evidence.<ref>{{cite book |last=Segev|first= Tom |date=2012 |title=Simon Wiesenthal: The Life and Legends |publisher=Schocken |edition=reprint |page=349}}</ref> In Ukraine, Demjanjuk was viewed as a national hero and received a personal invitation to return to Ukraine by then-president [[Leonid Kravchuk]].{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=110}} After Demjanjuk's acquittal, the [[Israeli Attorney General]] decided to release him rather than to pursue charges of committing crimes at Sobibor. Ten petitions against the decision were made to the Supreme Court. On 18 August 1993, the court rejected the petitions on the grounds that
# the principle of [[double jeopardy]] would be infringed,
# new charges would be unreasonable given the seriousness of those of which he had been acquitted,
# conviction on the new charges would be unlikely, and
# Demjanjuk was extradited from the United States specifically to stand trial for offenses attributed to Ivan the Terrible of Treblinka, and not for other alternative charges.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Anti-Semitism%20and%20the%20Holocaust/Documents%20and%20communiques/DECISION%20OF%20ISRAEL%20SUPREME%20COURT%20ON%20PETITION%20CONCE |title=Decision of Israel Supreme Court on petition concerning John (Ivan) Demjanjuk |publisher=Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs |date=18 August 199|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>

During the trial, the prosecution argued that Demjanjuk should be tried for crimes at Sobibor; however, Justice Aharon Barak was not convinced, stating, "We know nothing about him at Sobibor."<ref>{{cite book |last=Pyle |first= Christopher H. |year= 2001 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8iEWsWUjHA8C |title=Extradition, Politics, and Human Rights |publisher=Temple University Press |isbn=978-1-56639-823-7 |chapter=10. Extradition as a substitute for deportation: Getting Ivan|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Demjanjuk was released to return to the United States. His return was met by protests and counter-protests, with supporters including members of the [[Ku Klux Klan]].{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=112}} Even before his acquittal by the Israeli Supreme Court, the [[US Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals]] had opened an investigation into whether OSI had withheld evidence from the defense. The investigation charged that OSI had ignored evidence indicating that Demjanjuk was not Ivan the Terrible, and uncovered an internal OSI memo that questioned the case against Demjanjuk.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=114–116}} After Demjanjuk's acquittal in Israel, the panel of judges on the Sixth Circuit ruled against OSI for having committed fraud on the court and having failed to provide exculpatory evidence to Demjanjuk's defense.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=116–117}}

==Second loss of US citizenship and extradition to Germany==
[[File:Wikipedia-sobibor-2.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Sobibor]] "Road to Death" in 2007]]
On 20 February 1998, Judge [[Paul Matia]] of the [[US District Court for the Northern District of Ohio]] vacated Demjanjuk's denaturalization "without prejudice," meaning that OSI could seek to strip Demjanjuk of citizenship a second time.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=123}} OSI continued to investigate Demjanjuk, relying solely on documentary evidence rather than eye-witnesses.<ref name="auto"/> These documents were found in former Soviet archives in Moscow and in Lithuania, which placed Demjanjuk at Sobibor on 26 March 1943, at [[Flossenbürg concentration camp|Flossenbürg]] on 1 October 1943, and at [[Majdanek]] from November 1942 through early March 1943; administrative documents from Flossenbürg referencing Demjanjuk's name and Trawniki card number were also uncovered.<ref name = "US Holocaust Museum"/> On 19 May 1999, the [[United States Department of Justice|Justice Department]] filed a complaint against Demjanjuk to seek his denaturalization.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=126}} The complaint alleged that Demjanjuk served as a guard at the [[Sobibor extermination camp|Sobibór]] and [[Majdanek]] camps in Poland under German occupation and as a member of an [[SS death's head battalion]] at Flossenbürg.<ref name = "US Holocaust Museum"/> The complaint relied on evidence compiled by historians [[Charles W. Sydnor Jr.]] and Todd Huebner, who compared Demjanjuk's Trawniki card to 40 other known cards and found that issues on the card that had fueled suspicions of fraud were in fact typical of Trawniki's poor record keeping.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=126–127}}

In February 2002, Judge Matia revoked Demjanjuk's US citizenship.<ref name="ClevelandJewishNews22032012">{{cite news |url=http://www.clevelandjewishnews.com/article_245c2a22-742c-11e1-a3fa-0019bb2963f4.html |title=John Demjanjuk: Timeline of his life |newspaper=[[Cleveland Jewish News]] |date=22 March 2012|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> Matia ruled that Demjanjuk had not produced any credible evidence of his whereabouts during the war and that the Justice Department had proved its case against him. Demjanjuk appealed to the [[US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit]], which on 30 April 2004 ruled that Demjanjuk could be again stripped of his US citizenship because the Justice Department had presented "clear, unequivocal and convincing evidence" of Demjanjuk's service in Nazi death camps.<ref>{{cite court |litigants=USA v. Demjanjuk |opinion=No. 02-3529 |court=6th Cir. |date=30 April 2004 |url=http://www.ca6.uscourts.gov/opinions.pdf/04a0125p-06.pdf|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> The [[United States Supreme Court]] declined to hear his appeal in November 2004.<ref name="database">{{cite web |url=http://www.internationalcrimesdatabase.org/Case/191/Demjanjuk/ |title=State of Israel v. Ivan (John) Demjanjuk |website=International Crimes Database|publisher= Asser Institute |date=2016|access-date=21 December 2016}}</ref>

On 28 December 2005, an immigration judge ordered Demjanjuk deported to Germany, Poland or Ukraine. In an attempt to avoid deportation, Demjanjuk sought protection under the [[United Nations Convention against Torture]], claiming that he would be prosecuted and tortured if he were deported to Ukraine. Chief US Immigration Judge Michael Creppy ruled there was no evidence to substantiate Demjanjuk's claim that he would be mistreated if he were sent to Ukraine.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/29/national/29demjanjuk.html |title=Judge orders accused camp guard deported |work=The New York Times |date=29 December 2005 |agency= Associated Press |access-date=28 March 2017}}</ref> On 22 December 2006, the [[Board of Immigration Appeals]] upheld the deportation order.<ref name="BBCNews">{{cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6202319.stm |title=US 'Nazi guard' faces deportation |work=BBC News |date=22 December 2006|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> On 30 January 2008, the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit denied Demjanjuk's request for review. On 19 May 2008, the [[US Supreme Court]] denied Demjanjuk's petition for [[certiorari]], declining to hear his case against the deportation order. The Supreme Court's denial of review meant that the order of removal was final; no other appeal was possible.<ref>{{cite court |url=https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/051908.ZOR.html |litigants=Demjanjuk v. Mukasey |opinion=no. 07-10487 |court=US Supreme Court |date=19 May 2008 |access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref><ref name="Y">{{cite news |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSN1952867920080519 |title=Accused Nazi guard Demjanjuk loses court appeal |work=Reuters |date=19 May 2008|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref>

One month after the US Supreme Court's refusal to hear Demjanjuk's case, on 19 June 2008, Germany announced it would seek the extradition of Demjanjuk to Germany. The file on Demjanjuk was compiled by Germany's [[Central Office for the Investigation of National Socialist Crimes]].<ref>{{cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7721631.stm |title=Germans seek 'Nazi guard' charges |work=BBC News |date=11 November 2008|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Germany-Nazi-Guard.html |title=Germany seeks extradition of Nazi guard from US |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |date=19 June 2008|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> On 10 November 2008, German federal prosecutor [[Kurt Schrimm]] directed prosecutors to file in Munich for extradition, since Demjanjuk once lived there. On 9 December 2008, a German federal court declared that Demjanjuk could be tried for his role in the Holocaust.<ref>{{cite news |title=Court: 'Ivan the Terrible' can be tried in Germany |url=http://www.thelocal.de/national/20081211-16079.html |agency=Agence France-Presse |work=The Local |date=11 December 2008 |access-date=13 December 2008}}</ref> Some three months later, on 11 March 2009, Demjanjuk was charged with more than 29,000&nbsp;counts of accessory to murder of Jewish prisoners at the Sobibor extermination camp.<ref>{{cite news |last=Rising|first= David |date=11 March 2009 |url=https://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090311/ap_on_re_eu/eu_germany_demjanjuk |title=Former Nazi camp guard charged 29,000&nbsp;times |agency=Associated Press|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> The [[German foreign ministry]] announced on 2 April 2009 that Demjanjuk would be transferred to Germany the following week,<ref>{{cite news |title=Former Nazi camp guard to be deported to Germany |url=http://edition.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/04/02/nazi.guard/?iref=mpstoryview |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090405172839/http://edition.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/04/02/nazi.guard/?iref=mpstoryview |url-status=dead |archive-date=5 April 2009 |work=CNN|date=2 April 2009 |access-date=2 April 2009}}</ref> and would face trial beginning 30 November 2009.<ref>{{cite news |title=John Demjanjuk's trial in Germany to start 30 November |url=http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2009/10/john_demjanjuks_trial_in_germa_1.html |newspaper=[[The Plain Dealer]] |date=6 October 2009 |access-date=6 October 2009}}</ref>

On 2 April 2009, Demjanjuk filed a motion in an immigration trial court in [[Virginia]]. The motion sought to reopen the matter of the removal order against him; that order of removal had been originally issued by an immigration court in 2005, had been upheld by the BIA on administrative appeal in late 2006,<ref name="BBCNews"/> and was further upheld by the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals; after these two appeals, the US Supreme Court had, as noted above, denied any review.<ref name="Y"/> On 3 April 2009, US Immigration Judge Wayne Iskra temporarily stayed Demjanjuk's deportation;<ref name=Reuters-2009-04-03>{{cite news |title=U.S. judge stays Demjanjuk deportation |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE5326L620090403 |work=Reuters |date=3 April 2009 |access-date=3 April 2009 |first=Sharon |last=Reich}}</ref> Iskrka reversed himself on 6 April.<ref>{{cite news |title=U.S. judge allows deportation of accused Nazi guard |url=http://ca.reuters.com/article/idCATRE5353SF20090406 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20150131202403/http://ca.reuters.com/article/idCATRE5353SF20090406 |url-status=dead |archive-date=31 January 2015 |work=Reuters |date=6 April 2009 |access-date=6 April 2009}}</ref> As the US government noted, a motion to reopen, such as Demjanjuk's, could only properly be filed with the [[Board of Immigration Appeals]] (BIA) in Washington, D.C., and not an immigration trial court. The issuance of the stay by the immigration trial court was therefore improper, as that court had no jurisdiction over the matter. Accordingly, Demjanjuk re-filed his motion to reopen, and for an attendant stay, with the BIA.<ref name="X1">{{cite web |url=http://www.ca6.uscourts.gov/internet/documents/GovernmentResponse.pdf |title=6th Circuit Brief |publisher=United States Courts |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090419064313/http://www.ca6.uscourts.gov/internet/documents/GovernmentResponse.pdf |archive-date=19 April 2009|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref><ref name= CNN>{{cite news |title=Nazi suspect's deportation appeal rejected |url=http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/04/10/nazi.suspect.deportation/index.html |work=CNN |date=10 April 2009 |access-date=10 April 2009}}</ref> On 10 April, the BIA found there was "little likelihood of success that [Demjanjuk's] pending motion to re-open the case will be granted" and accordingly denied his motion for a stay pending the disposition of his motion to reopen. This removed any obstacles to federal agents seizing him for deportation to Germany.<ref name= CNN />

On 14 April 2009, immigration agents removed Demjanjuk from his home in preparation for deportation.<ref name=AP1>{{cite news |title=Demjanjuk removed from Ohio home on stretcher |url=https://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5g2v8DW3HMQZ6Y10UI-GQXPnez11QD97IE0R00 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090417063544/http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5g2v8DW3HMQZ6Y10UI-GQXPnez11QD97IE0R00 |url-status=dead |archive-date=17 April 2009 |agency=Associated Press |date=14 April 2009 |access-date=14 April 2009}}</ref> The same day, Demjanjuk's son filed a motion in the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit asking that the deportation be stayed,<ref name=AP1/> which was subsequently granted.<ref name=CNN1>{{cite news |title=Nazi war crimes suspect granted emergency stay|url=http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/04/14/us.nazi.suspect/index.html |work=CNN |date=14 April 2009 |access-date=14 April 2009}}</ref> The US government argued that the Court of Appeals has no jurisdiction to review the decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals, which denied the stay.<ref>{{cite court |litigants=Demjanjuk v. Holder |quote=Respondent's Opposition to Petitioner's Petition for Review and Motion for Stay of Removal |url=http://www.ca6.uscourts.gov/internet/documents/GovernmentResponse.pdf  |court=6th Cir. |date=14 April 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090419064313/http://www.ca6.uscourts.gov/internet/documents/GovernmentResponse.pdf |archive-date=19 April 2009 |url-status=dead|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Demjanjuk later won a last-minute stay of deportation, shortly after US immigration agents carried him from his home in a wheelchair to face trial in Germany. The BIA denied Demjanjuk's motion to reopen his deportation case. On 1 May 2009, the Sixth Circuit lifted the [[Preliminary injunction|stay]] that it had imposed against Demjanjuk's deportation order.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8029574.stm |title=Demjanjuk loses deportation case |work=BBC News |date=1 May 2009|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> On 7 May 2009, the US Supreme Court, via Justice [[John Paul Stevens]], declined to consider Demjanjuk's case for review, thereby denying Demjanjuk any further stay of deportation.<ref name=Sp>{{cite news |last=Meyer|first= Cordula |date=8 May 2009 |url=http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,623665,00.html#ref=nlint |title=Alleged Nazi guard Demjanjuk hits legal brick wall |work=[[Der Spiegel]]|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Demjanjuk had sued Germany on 30 April 2009 to try to block the German government's agreement to accept Demjanjuk from the US.<ref name=Spiegel>{{cite news |last=Meyer|first= Cordula |date=1 May 2009 |url=http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,622357,00.html |title=Demjanjuk sues German government |work=[[Der Spiegel]]}}</ref> The [[German Administrative Court]] rejected Demjanjuk's claim on 6 May.<ref name=Bloomberg>{{cite news |last=Matussek|first= Karin |date=6 May 2009 |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601100&sid=aNt5rPIHBQRQ&refer=germany |title=Demjanjuk loses German court bid to block deportation |agency=[[Bloomberg LP]]|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Demjanjuk was deported to Germany, leaving Cleveland, Ohio, on 11 May, to arrive in [[Munich]] on 12 May. Upon his arrival, he was arrested and sent to Munich's [[Stadelheim prison]].<ref>{{cite news |last1=Fischer|first1= Sebastian |last2=Neumann|first2= Conny |last3=Meyer|first3= Cordula |date=12 May 2009 |url=http://www.spiegel.de/panorama/zeitgeschichte/0,1518,624265,00.html |title=Krankenwagen bringt Demjanjuk ins Untersuchungsgefängnis |work=[[Der Spiegel]]|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>

==Trial in Germany==
On 3 July 2009, prosecutors deemed Demjanjuk fit to stand trial. On 13 July 2009, prosecutors charged him with 27,900&nbsp;counts of accessory to murder for his time as a guard at Sobibor.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,4475603,00.html |title=Germany files charges against alleged Nazi guard Demjanjuk |publisher=[[Deutsche Welle]] |date=13 July 2009|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> Demjanjuk was tried without any connection to a concrete act of murder or cruelty but rather on the theory that as a guard at Sobibor he was ''per se'' guilty of murder, a novelty in the German justice system that was seen as risky for the prosecution.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=154–160}} Some 35 plaintiffs were admitted to file in the case, including four survivors of the Sobibor concentration camp and 26 relatives of victims.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.zentralratdjuden.de/de/article/2411.html |title=Statement of the ZDJ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090519220859/http://www.zentralratdjuden.de/de/article/2411.html |archive-date=19 May 2009 |date=12 May 2009 |language=de|publisher=Zentralrat der Juden in Deutschland|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> The indictment made almost no mention of Demjanjuk's service at Majdanek or Flossenbürg, as these were not extermination camps.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=142–143}}

Demjanjuk was represented by German attorneys Ulrich Busch and Günther Maul. The defense argued that Demjanjuk had never been a guard but that, had he been one, he would have had no choice in the matter.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=235}} Busch alleged that the German justice system was prejudiced against his client, and that the entire trial was therefore illegitimate.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=231}} Busch also alleged that the trial violated the principle of [[double jeopardy]] due to the previous trial in Israel.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=234}} According to Munich state prosecutor Anton Winkler, doctors restricted the time Demjanjuk could be tried in court each day to two sessions of 90 minutes each.<ref name="ap demjanjuk att'y">{{cite news |newspaper=[[The Seattle Times]] |url=http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2009611597_apeugermanydemjanjuk.html |title=Demjanjuk lawyer calls for case to be closed |agency= Associated Press |date=6 August 2009|access-date=14 January 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121015170523/http://seattletimes.com/html/nationworld/2009611597_apeugermanydemjanjuk.html |archive-date=2012-10-15 |url-status=dead}}</ref> On 30 November 2009, Demjanjuk's trial, expected to last for several months, began in [[Munich]].<ref>{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8386576.stm|title=John Demjanjuk war crimes trial begins in Munich|work=BBC News|date=30 November 2009|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> Demjanjuk arrived in the courtroom in a wheelchair pushed by a German police officer.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/01/world/europe/01trial.html|title=Man Tied to Death Camp Goes on Trial in Germany|newspaper=The New York Times|date=30 November 2009|last=Kulish|first=Nicholas|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> Because of the long pauses between trial dates and cancellations caused by the alleged health problems of the defendant and his defense attorney Busch's use of many legal motions, the trial eventually stretched to eighteen months.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=242}}

On 14 April 2010, Anton Dallmeyer, an [[expert witness]], testified that the typeset and handwriting on an ID card being used as key evidence matched four other ID cards believed to have been issued at the SS training camp at Trawniki. Demjanjuk's lawyer argued that all of the ID cards could be forgeries and that there was no point comparing them.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sdut-expert-demjanjuk-id-appears-authentic-2010apr14-story.html |title=Expert: Demjanjuk ID appears authentic |first=Andrea M. |last=Jarach |agency=Associated Press |work=The San Diego Union-Tribune |date=14 April 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180629224151/https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sdut-expert-demjanjuk-id-appears-authentic-2010apr14-story.html |archive-date=29 June 2018 |url-status=live |access-date=26 September 2020}}</ref> The prosecution also produced orders to a man identified as Demjanjuk to go to Sobibor and other records to show that Demjanjuk had served as a guard there.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/18/world/europe/john-demjanjuk-nazi-guard-dies-at-91.html |title=John Demjanjuk, 91, Dogged by Charges of Atrocities as Nazi Camp Guard, Dies |work=The New York Times |date=17 March 2012 |last=McFadden |first=Robert D.|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> Demjanjuk's defense team argued that these documents were Soviet forgeries.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/18/world/europe/john-demjanjuk-nazi-guard-dies-at-91.html |work=The New York Times|title=John Demjanjuk, 91, Dogged by Charges of Atrocities as Nazi Camp Guard, Dies |date=17 March 2012|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> As part of the prosecution's case, historian [[Dieter Pohl]] of the [[University of Klagenfurt]] testified that Sobibor was a death camp, the sole purpose of which was the killing of Jews, and that all Trawniki men had been generalists involved in guarding the prisoners as well as other duties; therefore, if Demjanjuk was a Trawniki man at Sobibor, he had necessarily been involved in sending the prisoners to their deaths and was an accessory to murder.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=219–220}} The prosecution further argued, using Pohl's testimony, firstly that Demjanjuk's choice after being captured by the Germans was guard duty or forced labor, not death, secondly that the Trawniki guards were a privileged group that was essential to [[the Holocaust]], and finally that Demjanjuk's failure to desert, something many Trawniki guards did, showed that he had been at Sobibor voluntarily.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=225–228}}

On 24 February 2010, a witness for the prosecution, Alex Nagorny, who agreed to serve the Nazi Germans after his capture, testified that he knew Demjanjuk from his time as a guard. When asked to identify Demjanjuk in the courtroom, Nagorny was unable to, stating: "That's definitely not him – no resemblance."<ref>{{cite news |agency=Associated Press |newspaper=Haaretz |date=18 February 2011 |title=Witness in alleged Nazi Demjanjuk trial under investigation for murder |url=https://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/witness-in-alleged-nazi-demjanjuk-trial-under-investigation-for-murder-1.344255|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> As Nagorny had previously identified Demjanjuk from his US visa application photo, his inability to recognize Demjanjuk in the courtroom was seen as incongruous.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=215}} Demjanjuk declined to testify or make a final statement during the trial;{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=247–248}} however, he delivered three written declarations to the court that alleged that his prosecution was caused by a conspiracy between the OSI, the [[World Jewish Congress]], and the [[Simon Wiesenthal Center]], while continuing to allege that the KGB had forged the documents used. In his third declaration, Demjanjuk demanded access to a secret KGB file numbered 1627 and declared a hunger strike until he got it.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|pp=235–238}}

On 15 January 2011, Spain requested a European [[arrest warrant]] be issued for Nazi war crimes against Spaniards; the request was refused for a lack of evidence.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.jta.org/news/article/2011/06/12/3088101/german-court-rejects-demjanjuk-extradition-request |title=German court rejects Demjanjuk extradition request |publisher=JTA |date=12 June 2011 |access-date=21 January 2012}}</ref> On 12 May 2011, aged&nbsp;91, Demjanjuk was convicted as an [[Accessory (legal term)|accessory]] to the murder of 28,060&nbsp;Jews at Sobibor killing center and sentenced to five years in prison with two years already served.<ref name= "Matussek">{{cite news |last= Matussek | first=Karin |title=Demjanjuk convicted of helping Nazis to murder Jews during the Holocaust |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-12/demjanjuk-convicted-of-helping-nazis-to-murder-jews-during-the-holocaust.html |access-date=12 May 2011 |publisher=Bloomberg LP |date=12 May 2011}}</ref><ref name="welt.de">{{cite news |title=John Demjanjuk zu fünf Jahren Haft verurteilt |url= https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article13367603/John-Demjanjuk-zu-fuenf-Jahren-Haft-verurteilt.html| access-date=12 May 2011 |newspaper=[[Die Welt]] |date=12 May 2011}}</ref><ref name="Connor">{{cite news | last= Connor | first= Richard | title= Court finds Nazi camp guard guilty of assisting in Holocaust deaths |url=http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,15068941,00.html|access-date=12 May 2011 |publisher=[[Deutsche Welle]] |date=12 May 2011}}</ref><ref name="Kraemer">{{cite news |last=Kraemer |first=Christian |title=Demjanjuk convicted of Nazi war crimes |url=http://www.torontosun.com/2011/05/12/demjanjuk-convicted-of-nazi-war-crimes |access-date=12 May 2011 |newspaper=[[Toronto Sun]] |date=12 May 2011 |archive-date=13 May 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110513190516/http://www.torontosun.com/2011/05/12/demjanjuk-convicted-of-nazi-war-crimes |url-status=dead }}</ref> Presiding Judge Ralph Alt ordered Demjanjuk released from custody pending his appeal, as he did not appear to pose a flight-risk. This was the first time someone has been convicted by a German court solely on the basis of serving as a camp guard, with no evidence of being involved in the death of any specific inmate.<ref name="Nazi Criminal John Demjanjuk Dies">{{cite magazine |url=http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2109327,00.html |title=Nazi Criminal John Demjanjuk Dies |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120324063906/http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2109327,00.html |archive-date=24 March 2012 |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|Time]] |url-status=dead |date=17 March 2012|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref><ref name="Rising, David">{{cite news |last=Rising|first= David |agency=Associated Press |date=13 May 2011 |url=http://archive.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2011/05/13/demjanjuk_convicted_for_nazi_camp_deaths/ |archive-url=https://archive.today/20120708070345/http://articles.boston.com/2011-05-13/news/29540669_1_sobibor-nazi-death-camp-guard-john-demjanjuk |url-status=live |archive-date=8 July 2012 |title=Former US citizen convicted in Nazi camp deaths |newspaper=[[The Boston Globe]]|access-date=14 January 2015}}</ref> His release pending appeal was protested by some, including [[Efraim Zuroff]] of the Simon Wiesenthal Center.<ref name="Rising, David"/>

==Death and posthumous efforts to restore US citizenship==
John Demjanjuk died at a [[home for the elderly]] in [[Bad Feilnbach]], Germany, on 17 March 2012, aged 91.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17414127 |title='Nazi guard' John Demjanjuk dies|work=BBC News|date=17 March 2012|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> As a consequence of his appeal not having been heard, Demjanjuk is still presumed innocent under German law.<ref name="Aderet 2012"/> In early June 2012, Ulrich Busch, Demjanjuk's attorney, filed a complaint with Bavarian prosecutors claiming that the pain medication Novalgin (known in the US as [[metamizole]] or dipyrone) that had been administered to Demjanjuk helped lead to his death.<ref>{{cite news| agency= Associated Press| title= Demjanjuk attorney files complaint against doctors| date= 13 June 2012| access-date= 4 July 2012| url= https://www.foxnews.com/world/demjanjuk-attorney-files-complaint-against-doctors/ | publisher= Fox News}}</ref> The investigation was closed in November 2012 after no evidence emerged to support the allegations.<ref>{{cite news| title= Doctors Did Not Hasten Demjanjuk's Death | date= 27 November 2012| url= http://www.jewishjournal.com/world/article/german_prosecutors_say_doctors_did_not_hasten_demjanjuks_death |work= [[The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles]] | publisher= Tribe Media Corp| access-date= 7 June 2015}}</ref>

Following his death, his relatives requested that he be buried in the United States, where he once lived. Jewish organizations have opposed this, claiming that his burial site would become a center for [[neo-Nazi]] activity.<ref name=DemjanjukBBCNews2032012>{{cite news |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17448458 |title=Demjanjuk family asks to bury Nazi war criminal in US |work=[[BBC News]] |date=20 March 2012|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> On 31 March 2012, it was reported that Demjanjuk was buried at an undisclosed US location.<ref>{{cite news|work=Jewish Telegraphic Agency|date=13 April 2012|title=Ukrainian political party leader says Demjanjuk was buried in US weeks after his March death|access-date=23 April 2012|url=https://www.jta.org/news/article/2012/04/05/3092564/demjanjuk-reportedly-buried-secretly-in-united-states|archive-date=6 April 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120406223338/http://www.jta.org/news/article/2012/04/05/3092564/demjanjuk-reportedly-buried-secretly-in-united-states|url-status=dead}}</ref> On 12 April 2012, Demjanjuk's attorneys filed a suit to posthumously restore his US citizenship.<ref>{{cite news|last=Scott|first=Michael|work=The Plain Dealer|date=13 April 2012|title=John Demjanjuk's widow asks for hearing on citizenship of late husband, convicted Nazi war criminal|access-date=18 April 2012 |url=http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2012/04/john_demjanjuks_widow_asks_for.html}}</ref> On 28 June 2012, the 6th US Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati ruled that Demjanjuk could not regain his citizenship posthumously.<ref>{{cite news| agency= Associated Press| title= US court: No posthumous US citizenship for Demjanjuk, convicted in war crimes probe| date= 28 June 2012| access-date= 4 July 2012 |url= https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/us-court-no-posthumous-us-citizenship-for-demjanjuk-convicted-in-war-crimes-probe/2012/06/28/gJQA9lVC9V_story.html|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20120629151619/http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/us-court-no-posthumous-us-citizenship-for-demjanjuk-convicted-in-war-crimes-probe/2012/06/28/gJQA9lVC9V_story.html|url-status= dead|archive-date= 29 June 2012| newspaper= [[The Washington Post]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite court|url= http://www.ca6.uscourts.gov/opinions.pdf/12a0688n-06.pdf|litigants= US v. Demjanjuk| opinion=no. 12-3114, |court=6th Cir.|date= 28 June 2012|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> On 11 September 2012, the court denied Demjanjuk's request to have the appeal reheard ''[[en banc]]'' by the full court.<ref>{{cite news | url=http://www.sanluisobispo.com/2012/09/12/2224359/ohio-nazi-war-criminals-citizenship.html | title=Court rejects appeal for Demjanjuk citizenship | work=[[San Luis Obispo Tribune]] | date=13 September 2012 | agency=Associated Press | access-date=13 September 2012 }}{{dead link|date=December 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>

==Legacy==
The 1989 film ''[[Music Box (film)|Music Box]]'', directed by [[Costa-Gavras]], is based in part on the Demjanjuk case.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=98}} Author [[Philip Roth]], who briefly attended the Demjanjuk trial in Israel, portrays a fictionalized version of Demjanjuk and his trial in the 1993 novel ''[[Operation Shylock]]''.{{sfn|Douglas|2016|p=97}} In 2019, [[Netflix]] released ''[[The Devil Next Door]]'', a documentary by Israeli filmmakers [[Daniel Sivan]] and [[Yossi Bloch]] that focuses on Demjanjuk's trial in Israel.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium-was-john-demjanjuk-really-ivan-the-terrible-the-makers-of-the-devil-next-door-1.8195954 |title=Was John Demjanjuk Really 'Ivan the Terrible'? Even the Makers of 'The Devil Next Door' Can't Agree  |author=Allison Kaplan Sommer |work=Haaretz |date=4 December 2019|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>

===Subsequent prosecutions of Nazi extermination camp guards in Germany ===
Demjanjuk's conviction for accessory to murder solely on the basis of having been a guard at a concentration camp set a new legal precedent in Germany.<ref name="Nazi Criminal John Demjanjuk Dies"/> Prior to Demjanjuk's trial, the requirement that prosecutors find a specific act of murder to charge guards with had resulted in a very low conviction rate for death camp guards.<ref>{{cite book |last=Nagorski |first=Andrew |title=The Nazi Hunters |publisher=Simon and Schuster |year=2016 |pages=[https://books.google.com/books?id=9VAJCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA314 314]–[https://books.google.com/books?id=9VAJCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA315 315]|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9VAJCgAAQBAJ&q=Demjanjuk|isbn=9781476771885|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref> Following Demjanjuk's conviction, however, Germany began aggressively prosecuting former death camp guards. In 2015, former Auschwitz guard [[Oskar Gröning]] was convicted on the same legal argument as Demjanjuk; his conviction was upheld on appeal, solidifying the precedent made by the Demjanjuk case. In 2019, German prosecutors charged guards at a concentration camp—as opposed to a death camp—on the same rationale for the first time: former Stutthof concentration camp guards Johann Rehbogen and {{ill|Bruno Dey|de}}.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/europe/small-wheel-in-the-machinery-of-murder-former-ss-guard-to-stand-trial-in-germany-1.7652091 |work=Haaretz |title='Small Wheel in the Machinery of Murder': Former SS Guard to Stand Trial in Germany  |date=8 August 2019|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>

===Publication of photographs from Sobibor===
[[File:Group of auxiliary guards at the Nazi death camp Sobibor in 1943.jpg|thumb|right|Photograph of Trawniki guards at Sobibor, taken in 1943. This was not seen publicly until January 2020, when it was one of numerous photos from Sobibor newly exhibited in Berlin.<ref name="APphotos">{{cite news|url=https://apnews.com/83037ea123935d3ffec209f50cc4f799 |title= Historians: Sobibor death camp photos may feature Demjanjuk|first1=Kerstin|last1=Sopke|first2=Geir|last2=Moulson|work=Associated Press News|date=31 January 2020|access-date=9 August 2020}}</ref> The originals have been donated to the US Holocaust Memorial Museum. Demjanjuk was "inconclusively identified" as the guard in the middle of the front row.<ref name="Der SPIEGEL"/><ref>{{cite web|url=https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn715033#?rsc=207981&cv=107&c=0&m=0&s=0&xywh=-127,-1276,2515,4047|title=Sobibor perpetrator collection – Collections Search – United States Holocaust Memorial Museum|website=USHMM Collections|date=January 2020|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>]]

In January 2020, the [[Topography of Terror]] Foundation in Berlin announced that they were about to exhibit and publish a collection of 361 photographs taken by [[Johann Niemann]] over the course of his career, including from his time as deputy commandant of Sobibor, which had been made newly available by his descendants. They believe the collection includes two photos showing Demjanjuk with fellow guards at the camp, which would be the first documentary evidence to conclusively establish he had served there.<ref name="APphotos"/><ref name="Der SPIEGEL">{{cite news |url=https://www.spiegel.de/panorama/justiz/fotos-von-iwan-demjanjuk-im-kz-sobibor-aufgetaucht-a-308161c1-1a23-40bd-8b26-073a312fb7e5 |work=Der Spiegel |language=de|title='Fotos von Iwan Demjanjuk im KZ Sobibor aufgetaucht |date=19 January 2020|access-date=14 January 2025}}</ref>

On 20 January 2020, the day after the announcement, the Ludwigsburg Research Center qualified it by saying it is likely that one of the men in the noted photos is Demjanjuk but that this cannot be said "with absolute certainty" ({{lang|de|"mit absoluter Gewissheit"}}), given the time that had passed since they were taken.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.zeit.de/gesellschaft/zeitgeschehen/2020-01/john-demjanjuk-ns-verbrecher-fotos-vernichtungslager-sobibor|title=John Demjanjuk: NS-Verbrecher auf Fotos nicht eindeutig identifizierbar|last1=Spreter|first1=Jona|date=20 January 2020|work=Die Zeit|access-date=20 January 2020|language=de-DE|issn=0044-2070}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.haaretz.co.il/news/world/europe/.premium-MAGAZINE-1.8463540<!-- In English: https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/europe/2020-01-28/ty-article/.premium/historians-publish-photos-proving-john-demjanjuk-served-in-nazi-death-camp/0000017f-df8a-db5a-a57f-dfeab8df0000 --> |title=היסטוריונים גרמנים פרסמו תצלומים שמוכיחים: דמיאניוק שירת בסוביבור |trans-title=Historians Publish Photos Proving John Demjanjuk Served in Nazi Death Camp|last=Aderet |first=Ofer |date=28 January 2020 |work=Haaretz |access-date=28 January 2020 |language=he}}</ref> Niemann was killed there on 14 October 1943 during [[Sobibor uprising|a prisoner revolt]].<ref name="APphotos"/> The photographs were published on 28 January 2020 in the book ''Fotos aus Sobibor'' ("Photos from Sobibor").<ref>{{cite book|title=Fotos aus Sobibor – Die Niemann-Sammlung zu Holocaust und Nationalsozialismus|last1=Cüppers|first1=Martin|last2=Gerhardt|first2=Annett|last3=Graf|first3=Karin|last4=Hänschen|first4=Steffen|last5=Kahrs|first5=Andreas|last6=Lepper|first6=Anne|last7=Ross|first7=Florian|publisher=Metropol|isbn=978-3-86331-506-1|location=Berlin|oclc=1130365583|date=2020}}</ref> The Niemann family has donated the originals to the collection of the [[United States Holocaust Memorial Museum]], which has digitized this collection for research.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.ushmm.org/information/press/press-releases/sobibor-perpetrator-collection |title=United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Acquires Sobibor Perpetrator Collection |date=28 January 2020 |publisher=United States Holocaust Memorial Museum |access-date=30 January 2020}}</ref>

==See also==
{{div col|colwidth=27em}}
*[[List of denaturalized former citizens of the United States]]
*[[List of most-wanted Nazi war criminals]]
*[[Andrija Artuković]]
*[[Johann Breyer]]
*[[Algimantas Dailidė]]
*[[Yaroslav Hunka scandal]]
*[[Bohdan Koziy]]
*[[Erich Lachmann]]
*[[Karl Linnas]]
*[[Arthur Rudolph]]
{{div col end}}

==Notes==
{{notelist}}

==References==
{{reflist}}

==Bibliography==
* {{cite book |last=Kudryashov |first=Sergei |chapter=Ordinary Collaborators: The Case of the Travniki Guards |pages=226–239 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xM9wQgAACAAJ|title=Russia War, Peace and Diplomacy Essays in Honour of John Erickson |editor-first=Mark |editor1-last=Erickson |editor2-first=Ljubica |editor2-last=Erickson |location=London |publisher=Weidenfeld & Nicolson |year=2004|isbn=978-0-297-84913-1 |access-date=14 January 2025|via=Google Books}}
*{{cite book |last=Douglas |first=Lawrence |title=The Right Wrong Man: John Demjanjuk and the Last Great Nazi War Crimes Trial |date=2016 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-0-691-17825-7 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1LboBgAAQBAJ|access-date=14 January 2025|via=Google Books}}
* {{cite book |first=Richard |last=Rashke |title=Useful Enemies: John Demjanjuk and America's Open-Door Policy for Nazi War Criminals |date=2013 |isbn=978-1480401594 |publisher=Delphinium Books| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Z-0hsC2iFq8C |access-date=14 January 2025|via=Google Books}}
* {{cite book |title=Identifying Ivan: A Case Study in Legal Psychology |first=Willem Albert |last=Wagenaar |location=Cambridge, Massachusetts |publisher =[[Harvard University Press]] |year=1988 |isbn=978-0-674-44285-6 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PjkIAAAAIAAJ&q=identified+Ivan |access-date=14 January 2025|via=Google Books}}

==External links==
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{{Sobibor extermination camp}}
{{Nazis South America|state=collapsed}}

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