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US immigration board denies accused Nazi guard stay of deportation

By Bernard Hibbitts (editor) and University of Pittsburgh School of Law students.

[JURIST] The US Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) denied Friday the emergency stay of deportation filed by accused Nazi prison camp guard John Demjanjuk. In March, a Munich district court charged Demjanjuk with 29,000 counts of accessory to murder for his alleged involvement at the Sobibor concentration camp. Demjanjuk had filed the emergency stay of deportation denying the allegations and stating he was a Russian soldier held by the Nazis as a prisoner of war. Friday's decision makes it likely that Demjanjuk will be extradited to Germany. Last week, a US immigration judge revoked a stay of deportation issued for Demjanjuk. The stay had been ordered after Demjanjuk filed a motion to reopen his case. The immigration judge ruled that the stay had been ordered in error and revoked it, stating the motion should have been filed with the BIA. Demjanjuk has fought a lengthy legal battle over his alleged involvement with Nazi death camps during World War II. In 2008, the US Supreme Court denied certiorari in Demjanjuk v. Mukasey, ending the appeals process for his deportation order. Demjanjuk was appealing a 2005 ruling by then-US Chief Immigration Judge Michael Creppy which ordered his deportation. Demjanjuk had previously lost his appeal to the BIA. Additionally, the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit denied Demjanjuk's petition for review in January 2008. In 1988, Demjanjuk was convicted and sentenced to death by an Israeli court which found that he was a notorious guard from Treblinka nicknamed "Ivan the Terrible." The sentence was vacated by the Israeli Supreme Court in 1993, and Demjanjuk returned to the US.

Full post as published by JURIST - The Paper Chase on April 10, 2009 (boomark / email).