Sat, 31 Dec 2005 11:37:32
Confusion and uncertainty seem to be the only solid things in the case of John Demjanjuk
I just don’t know how to feel about this.
Losing another round in court, John Demjanjuk, the retired autoworker accused of being a Nazi concentration camp guard, may be running out of legal options in his decades-long deportation battle.
I’m all for a comprehensive legal process, but nothing should take decades to decide. Nothing. Except maybe the effect of soil erosion on coastal wetlands, or if Candice Michelle should move out of my spare bedroom. That decision we can take our time with.
More details:
Demjanjuk, who came to the United States in 1952, lost his U.S. citizenship after a judge ruled in 2002 that documents from World War II prove he was a Nazi guard at various death or forced labor camps.
Well, given that info...I’m not inclined to look at him favorably, shall we say.
Authorities first tried to deport Demjanjuk in 1977, accusing him of being Ivan the Terrible at the Treblinka concentration camp. In 1986, Demjanjuk was extradited to Israel, where he was convicted and sentenced to death after a dramatic, televised trial. But after a five-year legal battle, the conviction was thrown out when the Israeli Supreme Court found in 1993 that someone else apparently was Ivan the Terrible.
Oh. So...they actually convicted him of being Ivan the Terrible, then found out they were wrong?
That’s...not good. I’m a big supporter of the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the mission to hunt down and bring to justice all of these men, regardless of age and life activity since the 1940s. However, I’m not a big fan of trying and retrying someone until you get a conviction on something. They were wrong once before, and secured a conviction in Israel. Why should I trust that they’re right about his identity this time?
If you know for sure...deport and bring ‘im to justice in the right country (if it exists anymore). But when there is this much doubt and confusion...Father Time will do the job one way or the other. The man is 85 years old.
On the other hand, if he was a guard at Treblinka...I’ll volunteer to shove him on the plane myself. If he should happen to slip and plummet to the tarmac, well...one less mindless sadist order-following victim of Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei peer pressure in the world.
One way or the other, I’d like to know that they are absolutely certain that they know who he is this time.
Posted by JimK at 11:37 AM on December 31, 2005
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