Richard Rashke - Useful Enemies

“Upon whom was the burden of proof?”

“On him. But in most cases,” Brentar said, “I gave them the benefit of the doubt.”

“Why?”

“A person is not guilty… until he’s proven guilty.”

“Is there anything in the IRO manual that said you should give the applicant the benefit of the doubt?” Gonakis asked.

“Absolutely.”

Brentar asked for a copy of the IRO manual, the same book Daniel Segat had quoted from earlier. Brentar read: “If an applicant has no documents, then he should make an attempt to get them. If he has done so, or if it is impossible to do so, and if his story is otherwise credible, he should be given the benefit of the doubt. ”

Horrigan began his cross-examination of Brentar where Gonakis had left off.

“Would you turn to page eight of the IRO manual, please?” Horrigan said. “Do you see number thirteen?”

“Should I read it out loud?”

“Yes.”

Brentar read: “Most stories that are inconsistent seem to refer to wartime activities. But this often arouses a presumption of voluntary assistance to the enemy.”

Having made his point, Horrigan tried to impugn Brentar’s credibility as an expert witness.

“During the time you were in the IRO you saw [Soviet] repatriation teams, did you not?”

“Yes… escorted by MPs.”

Soviet repatriation agents were neither welcome nor safe in DP camps.

“And these individuals were allowed to visit DP camps only with the permission of the United States government. Isn’t that correct?”

“Yes.”

“No one could be forced to speak to Russian officials about going back home. Isn’t that correct?”

“Not in 1948.”

“Isn’t it true that on some occasions American government officials refused to allow Russian teams to come in and even speak to these individuals?”

“They were afraid there would be an uprising,” Brentar said. “And they couldn’t guarantee the safety of the Soviet repatriation team.”

“So it was voluntary repatriation?”

“Yes.”

“And you never saw any forcible repatriation any time you were over there, did you?”

“No I didn’t.”

Edward M. O’Connor, who held advanced degrees in political science and sociology and who had been awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Heidelberg, had served as a refugee relief leader immediately after the war. The U.S. Army considered O’Connor’s work so important that it gave him the temporary rank of major general and a hassle-free travel pass signed by General Dwight D. Eisenhower.

As a hands-on expert on displaced persons, O’Connor had testified before Congress and the United Nations, and President Truman appointed him to the Displaced Persons Commission when it was created. Given his experience, O’Connor’s credentials as an expert witness on the plight of European refugees were impeccable. If the prosecution knew anything about his Catholic bias and his ties to the CIA and neo-Nazi organizations, it did not use the information to impugn his testimony in support of John Demjanjuk.

O’Connor’s only job as a defense witness was to establish beyond doubt that refugees were still deathly afraid of Soviet agents and repatriation in 1950.

“You testified that you had occasion to visit the [IRO] camps during your tenure as a commissioner between 1948 and 1952,” Martin said. “During that span of time, did you yourself experience any fear from the people who were in these camps?”

“Oh, yes,” O’Connor said. “And, more particularly, these kinds of matters were brought to my attention by the various chaplains of all faiths that were serving in these camps, who were very close to these political refugees…. I would try to persuade [them] that no one could be forcibly repatriated against their will. But those fears remained.”

O’Connor further testified that if a refugee lied about his past out of fear , the Displaced Persons Commission would show mercy, and the refugee would be given a chance to correct the lie. If he did, he would be eligible.

“Were you familiar with a Soviet list containing names of alleged Nazi collaborators?” Martin asked.

“There was no one list. There were many lists that the Russian repatriation teams had developed,” O’Connor pointed out. “U.S. military authorities would take it, call the people out and interview them, investigate them…. If they were found to be collaborators or having participated voluntarily in any activity with the Nazis, they would be turned over.”

Like that of the prosecution, the defense’s opening salvo was strong. All three of its expert witnesses presented clear and compelling arguments that Soviet citizens were afraid of forced repatriation well after 1948, the year the prosecution argued the practice had ended. The problem for the defense was—its strong argument was irrelevant. The Supreme Court had ruled in its precedent-setting Fedorenko decision that extenuating circumstances, like fear and voluntariness, could not be used in determining eligibility for a U.S. visa. The defense also failed to suggest with any degree of credibility that the Trawniki card was a forgery. Up to this point, the defense of John Demjanjuk was a hopeless nondefense.

Before the defense called its most important witness to the stand, it presented five reputation and character witnesses—the lay president of St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Church, the president of the church council, a fellow worker at the Ford plant, a neighbor, and the Reverend Stephen Hankevich, who had served at St. Vladimir’s for twenty years. Father Hankevich’s testimony was typical.

“How do you know Mr. Demjanjuk?” Gonakis asked the priest.

“He’s been a member of my parish since I arrived in Cleveland,” Father Hankevich said. “I see him at church practically every Sunday. The [Demjanjuks] are practical Christians, receive the sacraments of our church. Their children attend our school. He was on our board of auditors of our church, elected by the body of our congregation. He was a member of our Ukrainian school PTA.”

“Do you have an opinion as to Mr. Demjanjuk’s reputation for truthfulness and honesty?” Gonakis asked.

“Yes.”

“What is it?”

“I think he’s an honest man, a devoted man, a family man, a practical Christian,” Father Hankevich said.

The defense called John Demjanjuk to the stand.

The courtroom was packed on the morning of March 4, 1981, when Demjanjuk took the stand, and U.S. marshals were turning people away at the courthouse door. In an attempt to maintain order and control, they had resorted to issuing tickets to the trial. Inside the second-floor courtroom, more marshals walked up and down the aisles collecting tickets and escorting out anyone who had managed to sneak in.

From the witness chair, John Demjanjuk radiated the same calm and confidence he had from his pew in the front row facing Judge Battisti and the Treblinka survivor-witnesses. Other than leaning closer to his interpreter to ask a question, he sat still and not even a ripple of emotion clouded his face. He had waited six years for this moment and the chance to defend himself.

The Demjanjuk family’s ordeal began in 1975 with three mysterious phone calls in a row from a man claiming to be an officer at the West German consulate in Detroit. Vera took the calls. Each time she told the man, who refused to say why he was calling, that her husband was at work. A week later, the man appeared on her doorstep on Meadow Lane in Seven Hills. This time her husband was home.