1991: A LOOK BACK: New evidence in Demjanjuk case (12/29/91)

1991: A LOOK BACK

New evidence in Demjanjuk case

During 1991, evidence in Ukraine and the USSR was the focus of the Nazi war crimes case against former U.S. citizen John Demjanjuk, who is appealing his 1988 conviction and death sentence to the Israeli Supreme Court.

A Congressional delegation from the office of Rep. James A. Traficant (D-Ohio) spent five days in Ukraine attempting, without success, to obtain documents from Soviet files that the Demjanjuk defense claimed would prove Mr. Demjanjuk's innocence. The Ohio lawmaker had also sent a telegram to the Foreign Ministry of the Ukrainian SSR, asking it to intervene and help his delegation gain access to Soviet files which contained information on the person thought to be the real "Ivan the Terrible" of Treblinka, one Ivan Marchenko.

The files had been uncovered in November 1990 by Oleksander Yemets, a lawyer who chairs the Ukrainian Parliament's Human Rights Committee. While Mr. Yemets was reviewing the files, they were suddenly ordered transferred from the KGB archives in Ukraine to Moscow, where they were studied by an Israeli delegation.

Speaking in February at The City Club of Cleveland, known as a "citadel of free speech," Edward Nishnic, president of the John Demjanjuk Defense Fund, told his audience that evidence in the possession of Soviet authorities as well as witnesses in Ukraine will prove his father-in-law is not the notorious "Ivan." Mr. Nishnic revealed that he and other defense team members had found three women in Ukraine who had been forced to work as cooks in Treblinka. All three gave a description of "Ivan the Terrible" that does not match that of Mr. Demjanjuk. All three also recalled that the Treblinka guard's real name was Ivan Marchenko. Mr. Nishnic also emphasized that the defense had been denied access to Soviet archives by Soviet authorities.

In June, Israel's Supreme Court ordered the prosecuting attorney in the Demjanjuk case to travel to the USSR and within 60 days to bring back evidence that may have determined once and for all whether Mr. Demjanjuk is "Ivan the Terrible." By this time some of the documents from the USSR had been delivered to Israel by the Soviet Procuracy; others, however, remained inaccessible. The Israeli prosecutor, Michael Shaked, failed to bring back the documents sought, however, he did examine some 15,000 pages of documents from military tribunals and civilian trials of guards who served at Treblinka, Sobibor and Trawniki. In mid-July Mr. Shaked filed a motion requesting an indefinite delay in Mr. Demjanjuk's final appeal and asked the court to determine what should be done regarding the documents remaining in the USSR.

Mr. Nishnic reacted to the prosecution's report with dismay: "John has been sitting there (in prison) too long already (since 1986)." He insisted that even the documents then available indicated that Mr. Demjanjuk is a victim of mistaken identity.

Soon afterwards, on July 25, the defense obtained copies of documents received earlier by the prosecution. Among them was a photo of two Treblinka death camp guards, one of whom was identified as M.K. Tkachuk and the other as Ivan Marchenko, who, according to the defense, is the real "Ivan." Also released to the defense were some 200 to 300 pages of statements and documents from the 1986 Soviet trial of Treblinka guard Feodor Fedorenko. "There are at least 100 mentions of Ivan Marchenko in these materials," including physical descriptions of the guard, Mr. Nishnic told The Weekly. And among those is a statement from Nikolai Shalayev, known to be "Ivan's" accomplice, he added.

As a result of the new information, the Supreme Court said it would hear defense arguments on August 14.

Defense attorney Yoram Sheftel argued that Mr. Demjanjuk should be freed immediately on the grounds that new evidence supports his claim that he is not "Ivan the Terrible." The prosecution argued that it now needed more documentation to verify the credibility of statements by guards who identified "Ivan" as Ivan Marchenko. Mr. Shaked also stated that Mr. Demjanjuk should remain in jail if only because the court had already established that he was at the Sobibor death camp and the Trawniki training camp for guards. "Is there a difference if he pushed a boy into the gas chambers in Sobibor or Treblinka?" he asked. The court refused to release Mr. Demjanjuk and scheduled another session of the Demjanjuk appeal for December.

On November 17 The Washington Post carried a lengthy article by Jackson Diehl about the new evidence in the Demjanjuk case which "suggests that Israel may have extradited, tried and convicted the wrong man." The article was reprinted in the November 25-December 1 issue of The Post's National Weekly Edition.

The Jerusalem Post's Ernie Meyer wrote in early December that Mr. Sheftel says his client is the victim of a frame-up begun 10 years ago in the U.S., and noted that "We may now prosecute the OSI (Office of Special Investigations)." Mr. Meyer also quoted The Washington Post story in which Mr. Sheftel stated: "We are talking about one of the worst mistakes in the legal history of the world as far as mistaken identity is concerned. This is a tremendous challenge to the credibility of our legal system. The court is going to have to admit that the whole prosecution of this man was a tragic error."

The Jerusalem Post also reported that the prosecution had found a German document that lists Ivan Demjanjuk and his serial number, (the same number that appears on the Trawniki identity card) as having been trained at Trawniki. The new evidence also notes that Mr. Demjanjuk served at Sobibor, Flossenberg and Regensburg. However, the documents do not establish Mr. Demjanjuk's presence at Treblinka. Mr. Meyer also wrote: "Meanwhile, the appearance of the names of Demjanjuk and Marchenko in documents emanating from German sources seem to disprove the prosecution claim that an 'Ivan the Terrible' named Marchenko did not exist and that, in fact, he was identical with Demjanjuk."

Soon thereafter, other news media, including The New York Times (December 18), picked up the story. The Times reported that Mr. Sheftel says copies of diplomatic cables, official letter and other documents show that the U.S. Justice Department knew as far back as 1978 that Mr. Demjanjuk was not "Ivan the Terrible." Moreover, that information was sent to the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv and then to Israeli officials, the defense attorney told The Times. Meanwhile in Washington, a senior Justice Department official revealed that the Demjanjuk case was being reviewed.

The Times story also quoted Yossef Lapid of the Israeli newspaper Maariv as saying, "At the very least, there are grave doubts regarding his (Mr. Demjanjuk's) identity. And, after all, a man whose identity is in doubt should not be convicted and certainly should not be hanged."

Israel's Supreme Court began to examine the defense's new evidence at a hearing on December 23.