Ex-pro-nazi Goes on Trial

A former Ukrainian who the U.S. government says lied about his pro-Nazi activities to obtain U.S. citizenship in 1956 went on trial today in West Palm Beach. The government claims that Bohdan Koziy, 58, who is now a manager of a hotel in Fort Lauderdale, wore a Nazi uniform in occupied Poland from 1942 to 1944 and killed at least eight Jews, including children.

Koziy, in pre-trial depositions, said he was a Ukrainian nationalist who had fought Germans and Russians in the closing year of the war. He contends that the charges against him are fabricated by the Soviet secret police. Koziy is not on trial for his alleged crimes but U.S. District Court Judge James Paine will decide if his citizenship should be revoked. According to the government, Koziy’s war record shows he “lacked the good moral character required for naturalization.”

Government lawyers travelled to Poland and the Soviet Union twice this year to interview witnesses of Koziy’s alleged war crimes and videotaped their testimony. These videotapes will be used in his trial.

TRIFA FILES AN APPEAL

Meanwhile, the Office of Special Investigations of the Justice Department announced that Rumanian Orthodox Archbishop Valerian Trifa had filed an appeal against his voluntary renunciation of citizenship and that a hearing on that appeal would begin in the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati on Oct. 9.

Trifa was indicted in 1975 on charges of concealing his ties to the fascist Rumanian Iron Guard when he entered the United States and when he became an American citizen in the 1950s. He surrendered his citizenship papers to federal officials in Detroit on Aug. 26, 1980, after an extended series of court actions.

On Oct. 31, 1980, Trifa filed an appeal in Jackson County (Michigan) federal district court, seeking cancellation of his yielding of citizenship. Allan Ryan, director of the Office of Special Investigation, will argue against the appeal in the Cincinnati appeals court.