Demjanjuk Convicted--But Free Pending Appeal

Remember the case of John Demjanjuk?

He was convicted, but Demjanjuk is still free:

“When we first heard the news that Demjanjuk had been convicted of his crimes, we were very pleased that justice had finally caught up with John Demjanjuk,” said Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder and dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center.


“But upon hearing the comments of the presiding judge, Ralph Alt, that Demjanjuk was free pending appeal and that -‘Keeping him confined would be disproportionate. The sentence can only begin once any appeal in the case is rejected. It doesn’t seem likely that Demjanjuk will actually serve any more time in the end. … The appeal will take at least a year and at that time his health may not allow putting him in prison’ - we feel that this is an insult to his victims and to the survivors, that after all of this they may see John Demjanjuk strolling in the park in Germany for having been complicit in the mass murder over 28,000,” added Rabbi Hier.

“At the very least they should have done, pending his appeal, is placed him under house arrest,” Hier concluded. [from an email from the Wiesenthal Center]

The judges comments seem to follow the same line of thinking as Demjanjuk's lawyer, who claimed his client had suffered "as much as the Jews did at the hands of Nazis."

I imagine there are many who would dispute that last point--if they had not died in the concentration camps.

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