The Canadian judge who delayed for 29 months the denaturalization of Nazi collaborator Jacob Luitjens has been reprimanded by the Canadian Judicial Council, the body of senior judges that investigates complaints against federally appointed judges.
No disciplinary action is planned, however, against Justice Frank Collier of the Federal Court of Canada.
The council’s Judicial Conduct Committee decided to discontinue its investigation because Collier finally released his decision, after a complaint about tardiness was lodged by Sol Littman of the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Canadian office.
Collier presided over the 11 weeks of hearings in Vancouver, British Columbia, in the landmark war crimes case, which stretched out intermittently from Sept. 26, 1988, to May 11, 1989.
The court heard from more than 50 witnesses and received more than 200 documents. A commission was in the Netherlands twice, from Oct. 21 to 26 and Nov. 29 to Dec.1, 1988, to get testimonies from 16 elderly Dutch who were unable to travel to Canada to testify.
Evidence was presented that the retired University of British Columbia botany instructor, 72, unlawfully gained admission to Canada for permanent residence in 1961 and obtained Canadian citizenship 10 years later by false representation and by concealing material circumstances.
More than two years after the trial ended, Collier said in a July 26 conference call with federal prosecutor Peter Kremer and John Campbell, the lawyer for Luitjens, that a decision could be expected by the first week of September.
To the frustration of Justice Department war crimes prosecutors and the anger of the Jewish community, no verdict was rendered as the deadline passed.
RULING ISSUED IN OCTOBER
On Oct. 11, after a 29-month holdup in the verdict of the precedent-setting case, Littman complained to the council, saying that judicial indecision brought the administration of justice into disrepute and could result in charges being dismissed.
On Oct. 23, Collier finally brought down his ruling, noting that Luitjens had lied about his past by failing to tell immigration officials he had been convicted in absentia by a Dutch tribunal in 1948 of aiding and abetting the enemy in time of war and had been sentenced to life imprisonment.
On Nov. 7, Luitjens was stripped of his citizenship, paving the way for him to be deported or extradited to the Netherlands.
Luitjens was a former member of the Dutch Nazi party and the Landwacht, a paramilitary unit which assisted the Gestapo in rounding up Jews and resistance fighters in occupied Holland. He operated in the Groningen and Drenthe provinces in northeastern Holland.
He surrendered to Allied troops in 1945 rather than face the wrath of his own countrymen but escaped from a military prison in 1946. He lived in Germany until 1948, and sailed for South America in May 1948 using the name Gerhard Harder.
Luitjens lived in Paraguay for 13 years before immigrating to Canada in 1961.
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.
