See more Seven Hills news at cleveland.com/seven-hills. Mr. Demjanjuk lost his U.S. citizenship in 1981, regained it in 1998 and lost it again in 2002, when the Office of Special Investigations brought a case based on war documents linking him to several Nazi concentration camps other than Treblinka. An expert on engines, he had operated the diesels that pumped out carbon monoxide to kill 870,000 people. He became an autoworker and changed his first name from Ivan to John. He returned home from work that day to find photographers waiting in his driveway to snap pictures of the alleged Nazi-collaborator. How can you?". The Associated Press quoted Mr. Demjanjuks attorney as saying he had myelodysplastic syndrome, a disease of the bone marrow and blood. In his broken English he explained that he was moved from one prison camp to another across Europe, spent long months in 1943-44 cutting peat, or perhaps laying railway ties, fought with anti-Communist Russians and ended up by 1945 driving trucks for the Americans. His father, Mykola, was a disabled veteran who lost several fingers fighting during World War I. Yes, yes, Mrs. Demjanjuk said outside church when asked if the ordeal had been difficult. In the early 1930s, the Soviets sought to destroy the Ukrainians for owning their own land. As manager of this memorial you can add or update the memorial using the Edit button below. They claimed that Demjanjuk had a cousin, also named Ivan, who grew up in the same village. WebVera Demajanjuk, 94 of Parma Ohio passed away Sunday September 22nd in Ohio. He was hospitalized for four months, released and sent back to the front lines, where he was captured by German soldiers in the Crimea in May 1942. Some Holocaust survivors and federal agents suspected her husband was a Nazi prisoner-of-war guard nicknamed Ivan the Terrible. "I worry about how they could continue to live here. Cookie Settings/Do Not Sell My Personal Information. Are you sure that you want to delete this flower? Holocaust survivors testified about Ivan the Terrible's sadistic behavior at Treblinka, saying he seemed to take pleasure in beating prisoners with a steel pipe and cutting off their limbs with a sword. Please join us in Loving, Sharing and Memorializing Vera Demjanjuk on this permanent online memorial presented by Chubenko Funeral. Besides his son, Mr. Demjanjuk is survived by his wife; his two daughters, Lydia Maday and Irene Nishnic; seven grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren. (AP Photo/Department of Justice) World War II-era military service pass for John Demjanjuk, who now stands trial for Nazi war crimes. If you purchase a product or register for an account through one of the links on our site, we may receive compensation. But his attorneys kept fighting. Vera Demjanjuk said the Justice Department's Office of Special Investigations "did this dirty job.". Failed to delete flower. Demjanjuk was convicted in May 2011 of the German charges after a trial that lasted more than 18 months. JimRead More, Flemington, NJ Frederic M. Compher, 92, entered eternal life on Monday, September 19, 2022, at his residence with loving family by his side. "The Devil Next Door" premiered Monday on the streaming service, and it focuses mostly on Demjanjuk's trial in Israel in the 1980s one of the last major Nazi war-crimes trials. Demjanjuk, a Ukrainian native who immigrated in 1952, worshipped at the cathedral in suburban Cleveland until his extradition to Israel in 1986. WebFind a Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/237962244/vera-demjanjuk: accessed ), memorial page for Vera Bulochnik Demjanjuk (9 Aug 192522 Sep 2019), Find a Grave Memorial ID 237962244, citing Saint Josephs Cemetery, Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, Ohio, USA; Please enter your email and password to sign in. Funeral arrangements will be announced shortly. "These were nobodies -- if in fact they were even there," McGinness said Saturday. It was a green SS ID card from the Trawniki camp in Poland, where No. According to his New York Times obituary, Demjanjuk was born on April 3, 1920 in the Ukrainian village of Dubovye Makharintsy. A system error has occurred. 0 cemeteries found in Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, Ohio, USA. Using a Nazi identification card with Demjanjuk's name, birth date and parentage, the Justice Department asked a federal judge to revoke Demjanjuk's citizenship, charging that he lied on his application and entered the United States illegally. Mr. Demjanjuk, like many of Vlasovs men, was sent to a displaced-persons camp, where he remained for seven years. The emotional trial, attended by many Holocaust survivors, led to an even more dramatic acquittal just a few years after he was sentenced to hang, when new evidence cast doubt on the accusations against him. Oops, we were unable to send the email. This memorial has been copied to your clipboard. He became a U.S. citizen in 1958. Make sure that the file is a photo. The emotional outburst came after defense attorney John Gill ended his final arguments and prosecutor Michael Shaked rose to respond to accusations that the prosecution had withheld from the defense documents that would exonerate Demjanjuk. If you purchase a product or register for an account through one of the links on our site, we may receive compensation. July 13, 2009 / 11:22 AM / CBS News. Resend Activation Email. After becoming aware of that, Soviet war-crimes investigators confiscated family records and photographs and branded Demjanjuk a traitor. Print Obituary Sign Guestbook Name: Location: Video: Image: Light A Candle Candle 1 Candle 2 Candle 3 Candle 4 Email: Please keep my message private Personal Message: Confirm: Submit Guestbook entry All rights reserved (About Us). He was wounded a second time in 1942, and he ended up in a Nazi forced-labor camp. After the war he met Vera, who would be his wife, in a German camp for displaced persons, and the two immigrated to the US in 1952, settling in Cleveland. Becoming a Find a Grave member is fast, easy and FREE. Mr. Demjanjuks trial in Israel included testimony from several Holocaust survivors who insisted that he was Ivan the Terrible, a sadistic gas-chamber operator at the Nazi extermination camp of Treblinka in Poland. It also challenged the identity card, saying the photo showed signs of having been lifted from another document, cited an incorrect height for Mr. Demjanjuk, and said its bearer had been at camps in Poland at Chelmno in 1942 and Sobibor in 1943 but did not mention Treblinka. He eventually settled in Seven Hills and worked as an assembly line mechanic at Ford Motor Co. in Brook Park. The sponsor of a memorial may add an additional. Try again later. Thank you for fulfilling this photo request. Ivan John Demjanjuk, a man with a hidden past, died on March 17th, aged 91. Obituaries Use the links under See more to quickly search for other people with the same last name in the same cemetery, city, county, etc. "Demjanjuk shows the Justice Department's determination to do the right thing, no matter the passage of time, to bring Nazi war criminals to justice," Alan Rosenbaum, a Cleveland State University philosophy professor and author of the book, "Prosecuting Nazi War Criminals," said Saturday. They also attacked the key piece of evidence against him in his three-decade legal fight: the Nazi guard pass that Matia had ruled contained Demjanjuk's picture, birth date and family history. A $300-million (minimum) gondola to Dodger Stadium? In his decision in February 2002, Matia said Demjanjuk and other Nazi-trained guards led Jews off the trains at Sobibor, disrobed them and led them to the gas chambers. WebView The Obituary For Vera Demjanjuk. He was there for 30 years. Obituaries Demjanjuk's family can have the body returned to the United States, but it is unclear whether that will take place. He had been a soldier in the Soviet army, and he contended that after he was captured by the Germans, he was a prisoner of war and not a guard at a Nazi death camp. On May 11, just days after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear his case, federal agents showed up again at Demjanjuk's home. He often attended his court appearances in a wheelchair or on a stretcher. Quickly see who the memorial is for and when they lived and died and where they are buried. Sorry! There is 1 volunteer for this cemetery. Demjanjuk entered the United States on Feb. 9, 1952, saying he spent much of his war years in the town of Sobibor, Poland. The Demjanjuks said they determined that they could not go home to Ukraine because he would be considered a traitor for allowing the Nazis to recruit him into an anti-Communist fighting unit. "My father will not live to fairly litigate the matter as has successfully been done before," Demjanjuk's son, John, said weeks after the deportation. In June 1941, the Germans invaded the Soviet Union, and he was wounded in fighting near Kiev. In 2009, Germany agreed to accept Mr. Demjanjuk as a deportee to stand trial on charges that he helped kill Jews at Sobibor. She wiped away tears as he held a book of Scriptures over her head to pray for a blessing for the Demjanjuks. Just a poor farm lad from Vinnytsia in Ukraine, both parents invalids, struggling through a time of disaster and famine. WebView The Obituary For Vera Demjanjuk. John Demjanjuks Family & Children: 5 Fast Facts Demjanjuks wife covered her head with a scarf and stepped forward before Hankavich for a blessing. It began Nov. 30, 2009. The Ukrainian-born Demjanjuk is accused of being Ivan the Terrible, a brutal guard who operated gas chambers that killed 850,000 Jews at Treblinka in 1942 and 1943. ", "How can somebody do this? Or had he been, as prosecutors charged, a collaborating guard who willingly participated in the killing of Jews at the Treblinka, Majdanek and Sobibor death camps? John Demjanjuk died Saturday in Germany, ending nearly 35 years of legal battles with officials in three countries who claimed he was a Nazi death camp guard. She noted he was acquitted in Israel. Particularly emotional testimony came from then-65-year-old Eliyahu Rosenberg, who, when asked whether he could identify the defendant, asked Demjanjuk to take off his glasses so he could see his eyes. "This marks the end of a decades-long effort in multiple countries that ultimately established the truth about John Demjanjuk's Holocaust crimes," said U.S. Attorney Steven Dettelbach in Cleveland. Its all been lies from beginning to end, Nishnic said tearfully after the trial, her hands shaking. Please ensure you have given Find a Grave permission to access your location in your browser settings. So the Israeli Supreme Court decided to overturn the conviction and let Demjanjuk go free. Print Obituary Sign Guestbook Name: Location: Video: Image: Light A Candle Candle 1 Candle 2 Candle 3 Candle 4 Email: Please keep my message private Personal Message: Confirm: Submit Guestbook entry John Demjanjuk was born Ivan Demjanjuk on April 3, 1920, in Debovye, Ukraine, The New York Times reported. This flower has been reported and will not be visible while under review. Released by Israel, Mr. Demjanjuk returned to Cleveland, where a federal appeals court overturned his 1981 conviction for lying on his immigration papers, saying prosecutors had deliberately withheld evidence and committed fraud. In 1958, Mr. Demjanjuk was naturalized. "'Oh, 'ma. Defense lawyers argued that the Soviets had falsified Mr. Demjanjuks identity card and other documents, but a judge found a clear trail of evidence showing his path from Soviet prisoner to Sobibor guard. Adam Bernstein has spent his career putting the "post" in The Washington Post, first as an obituary writer and then as editor. The unloading of the trains proceeded with loud cries, blows and also shots. Learn more about merges. The narrative was rocky, but one part, perhaps, was true. If someone worked at Sobibor, they killed Jews for a living.. "Supposed to be and so far as I know, but I can't be talking before somebody else because then . (AP Photo/Department of Justice) World War II-era military service pass for John Demjanjuk, who now stands trial for Nazi war crimes. Prison workers were building Mr. Demjanjuks gallows when the order came to release him. Eichmann, often called the architect of the final solution the Nazis plan to exterminate European Jews was hanged as a war criminal in 1962. The Soviets, in effect, starved a nation known as Europe's bread basket. Vera Demjanjuk said her grandchildren ask about their grandfather. Obituaries Yet he was not declared innocent, and his old life could never be resumed as before. Even some relatives of the victims, who were recognized as co-complainants at the trial, said it was the proof of guilt, finally, that counted. He was later drafted into the Soviet Red Army and in 1941, he was wounded in combat as the Germans tried to take control of Kiev. Sweeney, the OSI spokeswoman, said documents and testimony from those who served with Mr. Demjanjuk during the war support the following narrative: In mid-1942, Mr. Demjanjuk joined a force of non-German Nazi auxiliaries whose mission was to exterminate Jews in eastern Poland. He and his attorneys fought more than a dozen criminal cases and civil suits with trials in the United States, Israel and Germany over allegations that he had worked as a prison guard. He fought that accusation ever since 1977. John Demjanjuk was born Ivan Demjanjuk on April 3, 1920, in Debovye, Ukraine, The New York Times reported. DURING his nine decades, Ivan Demjanjuk had several identities. PARMA, Ohio (AP) _ As an Israeli court weighed her husbands fate, Vera Demjanjuk wept Wednesday while accepting the blessings of a priest. Top editors give you the stories you want delivered right to your inbox each weekday. 2023 Advance Local Media LLC. SEVEN HILLS -- The widow of John Demjanjuk bemoaned the United States government's role in spending taxpayers' money to prosecute her late husband. He died at that nursing home a little less than a year later, in March 2012. The Ukrainian-born Demjanjuk is accused of being Ivan the Terrible, a brutal guard who operated gas chambers that killed 850,000 Jews at Treblinka in 1942 and 1943. Martin Winkler, a spokesman for the Bavarian police, confirmed that Mr. Demjanjuk was found dead early Saturday in his room in a nursing home. Demjanjuk had said he was sent to a series of prisoner-of-war camps after his capture and did heavy labor. The Demjanjuk case represented one of the last major efforts by the Office of Special Investigations, a Justice Department unit formed in 1979, to identify, investigate and take legal action against suspected Nazi war criminals who resided in the United States, said department spokeswoman Laura Sweeney. John Demjanjuk's Family To use this feature, use a newer browser. John Demjanjuk was born Ivan Demjanjuk on April 3, 1920, in Debovye, Ukraine, The New York Times reported. From 1977 to 1993, however, he became Ivan the Terrible, who had roamed the concentration camp at Treblinka in Poland with a whip, or a sword, in his big mechanic's hands. After the familys outburst, presiding Judge Dov Levine told Shaked and the three-member defense team: You both ought to do away with this bitterness because . Access your favorite topics in a personalized feed while you're on the go. According to news reports, John Demjanjuk's son was quoted by the Associated Press as saying Germany used his father as a "scapegoat to blame helpless Ukrainian POWs for the deeds of Nazi Germans.". Obituary They claimed that federal prosecutors in the United States withheld a key FBI document that questioned the legitimacy of the guard pass. 'You live whole life like this and you come to country. He appealed, and the case was pending when Israel extradited him to stand trial as Ivan the Terrible. They raised millions of dollars for his defense, and neighbors voiced support for the man they knew as a kindly grandfather who kept his lawn neatly trimmed. Thanks for your help! Demjanjuk's family said Germany only took the case after caving to pressure from the Office of Special Investigation and the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Jewish human rights organization. Vera Demjanjuk, 86, of Meadowlane Road, said she last spoke to her late husband March 16. Please check your email and click on the link to activate your account. The Jerusalem courts verdict was expected Thursday. You can customize the cemeteries you volunteer for by selecting or deselecting below. He was released from prison in September 1993 and returned to his family in Seven Hills. You have chosen this person to be their own family member. Demjanjuk's widow looks to He was deported to Israel in 1986, and the trial began in 1987. He insisted that he was imprisoned at a labor camp near Chelm, Poland, and that in the final year of the war, he joined the army of an anti-Stalinist Russian general, Andrei A. Vlasov. Attempts to reach John Demjanjuk Jr. were unsuccessful Saturday. But in 1999, the government again sued to strip him of citizenship, charging that he had been a Nazi guard at Majdanek and Sobibor in Poland and at Flossenbrg in Bavaria. In the nearly seven decades since 250,000 people were put to death at Sobibor, no surviving witnesses, even those who had been shown photographs, could place him at the scene. Year should not be greater than current year. she said. Demjanjuks wife, and daughter-in-law, Linda Demjanjuk, attended the Ukrainian-language service in the gold onion-domed cathedral. He remembered less well what happened afterwards. Save to an Ancestry Tree, a virtual cemetery, your clipboard for pasting or Print. He moaned in apparent pain. Drafted again in 1941, he was wounded in the back at the Dnieper river; you could still see the scar. He kept the house blinds drawn so as not to see the Jewish protesters circling silently outside. In May 2011, the Munich court found Mr. Demjanjuk guilty and sentenced him to five years in prison. Demjanjuk appealed. She indicated the couple's ordeal was a disappointment compared to their life's hopes after having gone through famine and war and moving here in the early 1950s. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. A copy of his duty card from the camp in Trawniki, Poland. Anyone can read what you share. . WebDemjanjuk was born April 3, 1920, in the village of Dubovi Makharintsi in central Ukraine, two years before the country became part of the Soviet Union. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate, or jump to a slide with the slide dots. The documents suggested that Mr. Demjanjuk might have been a Nazi guard but that Ivan the Terrible was probably a man named Ivan Marchenko. John Demjanjuks wife and children shouted Youre liars! to prosecutors today after the defense rested in the former Ohio auto workers Nazi war crimes trial. WebView The Obituary For Vera Demjanjuk. Martin Winkler, a spokesman for the Bavarian police, confirmed that Mr. Demjanjuk was found dead early Saturday in his room in a nursing home. Prosecutors said he had volunteered to collaborate and had been trained at Trawniki to run diesel engines that supplied carbon monoxide for gas chambers. He was headed for the airport and on to Germany. John Demjanjuk, convicted Nazi death camp guard, was sentenced by a German court to five years in prison for 28,060 counts of accessory to murder. KGB documents, turned up by his Jewish lawyer when the Soviet archives fell open after 1991, seemed to prove that he was not Ivan the Terrible, whose surname had been different, and who had been shot in 1943. Demjanjuk David I. Andersen, Plain Dealer File Photo. The cause of death was unclear, though Demjanjuk's family has said he suffered incurable bone marrow disease. After the war, Demjanjuk found refuge in displaced persons camps. In 1945, while in the camp in Landshut, Germany, he met a Ukrainian named Vera. On April 14, federal agents carried Demjanjuk out of his home in a wheelchair and prepared to put him on an airplane. He was conscripted into the Soviet Army in 1941 but was wounded and captured by the Germans a year later. Ohio Auto Worker or Nazi? Man Stands Trial for By Ryan Smith. This account already exists, but the email address still needs to be confirmed. She has kept a low profile throughout the case and declined further comment. The American Society of Newspaper Editors recognized Bernsteins ability to exhume the small details and anecdotes that get at the essence of the person. He joined The Post in 1999. We have prayed for him nearly every Sunday.. "It's most fitting that he died in Europe, where he served the Nazi cause, and not in the United States. Fred was a ServiceRead More, Jeannette De Marco December 17, 2022 branchname, Obituary for James W. Ake at Countryside Funeral Home, Robert Kromer November 15, 2022 branchname, Obituary for Frederic M. Compher at Countryside Funeral Home, Altagracia Ramirez Elivo November 14, 2022 branchname, Lawrence J. Fagan November 4, 2022 branchname. This was the proper course for judges who cannot examine the heart and the mind, but have only what their eyes see and read, he wrote. But he was kind, letting pretty Maria Zagrebelna ride on his harrow, as she recalled, and padding the seat with grass for her. Use Escape keyboard button or the Close button to close the carousel. His family and friends have said he was weakened by the legal fight with the U.S. government to prove that he was not a Nazi guard. Family members linked to this person will appear here. Ivan Demjanjuk was born April 3, 1920, in the Ukrainian village of Dubovi Makharyntsi, then part of the Soviet Union. The couple had one son, two daughters, seven grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren, according to The New York Times. His activities and whereabouts from that time until he found his way to an American-operated displaced persons camp in 1945 became the focus of the trials he would face decades later. But that ID, plus lists of the prisoners he had escorted, plus the scar of an SS tattoo in his left armpit, filled those tricky years in captivity more plausibly than his ever-shifting alibis did. Critics' reviews are mixed, and it has an 80% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes. Demjanjuk THOMAS J. SHEERAN July 28, 1993. But his freedom was short-lived. After being convicted in Israel of crimes against humanity, he was acquitted just a few years later. Just how he spent the wartime years has never been confirmed. His family said he suffered from several health problems. Decades later, he testified that conditions were so bad in Nazi prisoner-of-war camps, I would have sold my soul for a loaf of bread.. It showed that after Sobibor was shut down in 1943, Mr. Demjanjuk served in a Ukrainian unit that fought alongside the Germans, was captured by American forces in 1945 and was sent to the displaced persons camp where he met and married the woman who was to share his odyssey. Later, the Justice Department offered video of Demjanjuk walking without help. cemeteries found within kilometers of your location will be saved to your photo volunteer list. An ambulance pulled into the family's garage, and he was gone. Despite the deportation order, none of the three countries appeared interested in taking Demjanjuk, and he remained in Seven Hills. Bodies were bloated by the rays of the sun. Yet he was not that brutal Ivan, he insisted. Ivan Demjanjuk (pronounced (dem-YAHN-yook) was born on April 3, 1920, in Dubovye Makharintsy, a village in Ukraine, to impoverished, disabled parents. His war and the terrors of concentration camps were all but forgotten. Please complete the captcha to let us know you are a real person. July 13, 2009 / 11:22 AM / CBS News. Vera Mar 24th 2012. The German press called the case the last major Nazi war crimes trial, one that would capture the attention of the world. Thanks for using Find a Grave, if you have any feedback we would love to hear from you. Try again later. You need a Find a Grave account to continue. He said Saturday that he and other attorneys working the case "wanted nothing more, nothing less than to be sure the truth about Mr. Demjanjuk's life is known.". U.S. Justice Department officials made several attempts to deport him because of allegations that he had lied about his wartime activities on his immigration papers. John Demjanjuk, an elderly former Ohio car worker who was born in Ukraine, was finally convicted of Nazi war crimes after decades of fighting attempts to bring him to justice. Vera Demjanjuk, right, seen with her husband, John, in a Cuyahoga County courtroom in 2006. Everyone of these people was nothing. In late September 2019, a Vera Demjanjuk of Ohio passed away. Ohio Auto Worker or Nazi? Man Stands Trial for John Demjanjuk's Family Plain Dealer archives also were used. In 1981, after years of delays, a federal judge ruled that Mr. Demjanjuk had lied on his immigration papers and revoked his citizenship. Your new password must contain one or more uppercase and lowercase letters, and one or more numbers or special characters. All photos appear on this tab and here you can update the sort order of photos on memorials you manage.