The identification of John Demjanjuk by a Treblinka survivor now deceased was admitted as evidence in Jerusalem district court Tuesday where the accused war criminal is on trial.
The three-judge panel waived the normal rules of evidence on grounds that Clause 15 of the law dealing with crimes committed by Nazis and their collaborators allows the evidence of deceased witnesses to be presented in such cases if the court considers it necessary.
The prosecution witness, Abraham Goldfarb, who died several years ago, made a positive identification of Demjanjuk as the sadistic death camp guard known as “Ivan the Terrible” from a photograph shown to him in May 1976, according to testimony by Israel Police researcher Maria Raddifker.
The photograph was No. 16 in a portfolio of photographs of suspected war criminals, Raddifker said. Goldfarb, who had been on the forced labor squad that built the gas chambers at Treblinka, picked out Demjanjuk’s photo and became “very excited.” He said it was “Ivan Grozny” (Ivan the Terrible), Raddifker testified.
He also recognized another war criminal, Feodor Federenko, but could not remember his name, she said. According to Raddifker, Goldfarb told her that from his mechanics workshop at the camp he could see Ivan running the diesel engine that pumped deadly gas into the chamber.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
