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U.S. judge strips Demjanjuk of citizenship

John Demjanjuk

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A federal judge in Cleveland stripped John Demjanjuk of his U.S. citizenship Thursday, concurring with government allegations that he guarded Nazi concentration camps during World War II.

Demjanjuk -- who had been accused of being "Ivan the Terrible," the notorious guard at the Treblinka Nazi death camp in Poland -- has for years battled the government's efforts to oust him, and he may appeal the latest decision.

Prosecutors in this case said Demjanjuk -- an 81-year-old Ukrainian -- had served willingly as a guard at Nazi camps for more than two years during World War II. The camps were Sobibor, Majdanek and Flossenburg. They said he participated in the process by which thousands of Jews were murdered in Sobibor.

When he came to the United States, they said, he hid his past as a Nazi guard. That made him ineligible for citizenship, they contended.

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In this case, prosecutors did not seek to show that Demjanjuk was stationed in Treblinka or was Ivan the Terrible.

Asked during a briefing in Washington if the United States is no longer alleging that Demjanjuk is Ivan the Terrible, Assistant Attorney General Michael Chertoff said the United States is not taking a position on the matter.

In this latest attempt to take away Demjanjuk's citizenship and have him deported, U.S. District Judge Paul Matia ruled the government successfully made its case that Demjanjuk entered the U.S. illegally after World War II, and must leave.

"Although the defendant claims he was not at the camps indicated by the documentary evidence, he has not given the court any credible evidence of where he was during most of World War II," said Matia.

"The government had the burden of proving its contention to the court by clear, convincing and unequivocal evidence. It did so."

Demjanjuk was given 10 days to surrender his passport and other government documents. It's not clear whether any appeal would delay that deadline. Demjanjuk is free at the moment and is expected to appeal the decision.

The case dates back to the late 1970s, when the Justice Department sought to revoke Demjanjuk's citizenship, saying he was Ivan the Terrible.

In 1981, Demjanjuk's citizenship was revoked. He was extradited in 1986 to Israel, where he had been convicted and sentenced to death in 1988.

However, his conviction in the Jewish state was overturned in 1993, mainly on new evidence that someone else was Ivan the Terrible of Treblinka.

Later that year, Demjanjuk returned to the United States, where a U.S. appeals court ruled the government fraudulently withheld evidence, reversing the order that authorized Demjanjuk's extradition to Israel.

His U.S. citizenship was later restored, but the U.S. Justice Department sought again to revoke it, citing evidence that Demjanjuk served as a Nazi guard.