Ex-guard for Nazis faces deportation

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Ex-guard for Nazis faces deportation

Postby lukpac » Wed Oct 01, 2003 3:56 pm

Our government doesn't have better things to worry about than deporting people who might have been forced to serve for the Nazis?

Ex-guard for Nazis faces deportation

Racine County man says he never killed any prisoners at the concentration camps

By GINA BARTON and MEGAN TWOHEY
gbarton@journalsentinel.com

Last Updated: Sept. 30, 2003

The U.S. government wants to deport an infirm Racine County man who says he has nightmares about his service as a guard in two Nazi concentration camps.

The civil action, filed Tuesday in federal court in Milwaukee, surprised the illiterate, retired sausage plant worker and his daughter. But federal officials say his participation in shocking brutality should cost him the American citizenship he gained almost 40 years ago.

Josias Kumpf, 78, admitted to investigators in March that he served as an armed guard at Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp north of Berlin and at Trawniki training and labor camps in Nazi-occupied Poland "on a couple of occasions during my regular military training," according to a statement filed with the complaint against him.

In an interview Tuesday, Kumpf said the Nazis would have killed him if he had refused to serve as a guard.

"They had lights and dogs," he said of the German soldiers who escorted him from his home in Yugoslavia in 1942, when he was 17. "If someone runs away, they'd shoot."

According to his statement, Kumpf was at Trawniki during a mass execution of prisoners on Nov. 3, 1943. However, "I did not participate in the shooting of the prisoners. My role was to guard the camp during the shooting so the prisoners could not escape."

While Kumpf stood guard, at least 7,000 men, women and children were gunned down in a mass murder operation known under the code name "Operation Harvest Festival," according to prosecutors.

"During the massacre, Jewish prisoners were forced to strip naked and lie on the corpses of other prisoners before they to were shot to death, while trucks with speakers played loud music to drown out the screams of the victims. No person who participated in such a shocking act of brutality should enjoy the privilege of U.S. citizenship," Eli M. Rosenbaum, director of the U.S. Justice Department's Office of Special Investigations, said in a statement. His office coordinates nationwide efforts to prevent former Nazis from entering the country and to deport those who do.

Came to U.S. in 1956

Kumpf says he arrived at the Polish camp toward the end of the mass killings, never killed anyone, left after two days and still has nightmares about the events.

"I feel sorry," Kumpf said. "I saw what they did to Jewish people. They were dying; they were like skeletons. I see the hole and people dying."

In his statement to authorities, Kumpf detailed his military history, saying he served as a combat soldier "fighting on the Russian front and against the Russians in Poland and Germany." At the end of the war, he was in France. Despite a retreat back to Germany, he was captured by the Russians and held as a prisoner of war for five months.

At the Russian prison camp, Kumpf was fed little and became very skinny, he said Tuesday. Afterward, he traveled in the custody of Russian soldiers from Germany to Yugoslavia, then to Austria. In Austria, he broke free and found his family, who had since moved there. He worked as a farmer, fixed roads and did a variety of other jobs.

In 1956, Kumpf, who was by then married and had children, applied for entry into the United States because he was making only $40 per month in Austria. At that time, and when he applied for citizenship in 1964, he described his combat experience but did not mention his service as a guard at the camps.

Tuesday, he said no one ever asked.

But because he concealed that "material fact," his citizenship was illegally obtained and must be revoked, according to the complaint. Had he disclosed his service to the Nazi regime when he applied for a visa, it would have been denied, according to the U.S. attorney's office.

The complaint also disputes Kumpf's characterization of his duties during the war and his assertions that he worked at just two camps for only a few days. It alleges that he was a member of the SS Death's Head Battalion - the Nazi cadre of concentration camp guards - for at least a year. In addition to serving at Sachsenhausen and Trawniki, prosecutors say, he worked at three other concentration camps: Majdanek in Lublin, Poland; Buchenwald in Weimar, Germany; and Mittelbau in Nordhausen, Germany.

Dozens deported since 1979

The information in the complaint was gathered by a historian in the federal Office of Special Investigations. Since 1979, when the office opened, 73 people who assisted the Nazis have been stripped of U.S. citizenship and 59 have been deported, according to the U.S. attorney's office.

The complaint against Kumpf is the third such action filed in the Eastern District of Wisconsin.

In 1990, prosecutors filed a complaint against Anton Tittjung, formerly of Greenfield, alleging that he had served as a guard at Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria. A federal judge ruled in the government's favor and revoked his citizenship in 1990. In affidavits, Tittjung said that he worked at the camp only under threat of being shot and that he never personally abused a prisoner. He appealed all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, where he lost in 2000. Then 75, he was ordered deported to Croatia.

At a 1991 trial, a federal judge determined that Anton Baumann, formerly of West Allis, had served as a guard at the Stutthof concentration camp in Poland. There was no evidence that he mistreated or killed any prisoners. Baumann's citizenship was revoked later that year, and an immigration judge ordered him deported to Germany. However, the judge allowed Baumann, then 82, to stay in the U.S. until his ill health improved. It never did, and he died in 1994.

Kumpf has 20 days to respond to Tuesday's complaint, which does not include criminal charges. He is entitled to a trial, at which a judge would determine whether to revoke his citizenship. If his citizenship is revoked, he must leave the country. His options would likely be Germany, because he is an ethnic German, or the city of his birth in the former Yugoslavia, which is now in Serbia and Montenegro.

Kumpf, who worked at Vienna Sausage in Chicago from 1956 to 1990, moved to Caledonia about 11/2 years ago, after his wife died. Kumpf, who cannot read or write and who needs help taking care of himself, now lives with his adult daughter and her husband.

His family members said they were surprised when they learned of Tuesday's action by the government. They said they had heard nothing since two officials interviewed Kumpf in March.

Kumpf said he has a sister in Germany but no family in Yugoslavia. He remained calm Tuesday, even though he doesn't want to leave the U.S.

"You can measure my pulse," he said. "I'm OK. I didn't do anything."

His daughter, Anneliese Krampitz, 53, isn't so sure.

"You didn't do anything," she said through tears. "But are they going to believe you?"


From the Oct. 1, 2003 editions of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
"I know because it is impossible for a tape to hold the compression levels of these treble boosted MFSL's like Something/Anything. The metal particulate on the tape would shatter and all you'd hear is distortion if even that." - VD

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Postby lukpac » Mon Oct 06, 2003 4:58 pm

The story continues.

Many area Jews cheer move to deport ex-guard for Nazis

By MEGAN TWOHEY
mtwohey@journalsentinel.com

Last Updated: Oct. 5, 2003

The Jewish community in southeastern Wisconsin is applauding the federal government's civil action last week that seeks to strip a retired Racine County man of his citizenship over his service as a guard in Nazi concentration and training camps.

Josias Kumpf, 78, who was born in Yugoslavia but has spent close to 40 years in the United States, said last week that he was forced at gunpoint to be a guard, never killed anyone - though he witnessed mass killings - and feels sorry for having been at the Nazi camps.

Holocaust survivors, rabbis and other members of the area's Jewish community don't buy it.

"Guards had no pity for anyone," said Rose Chrustowski of Glendale, who was held in a concentration camp in Germany from 1942 to 1945. "We were like animals to them. They whipped people and shot people. I was whipped on my back and still have scars today."

Chrustowski, 80, whose mother and four siblings died in concentration camps, says she was not at the camps where Kumpf served, but she believes no former guards deserve American citizenship.

"Kumpf came to the U.S. and enjoyed a beautiful life that my family and thousands of others didn't," she said. "I don't think that's justice."

Kumpf applied for entry to the U.S. in 1956 because he felt he wasn't making enough money to support his wife and three children in Austria, where he settled after World War II.

At that time, and when he applied for citizenship in 1964, he didn't mention his service as a guard at the camps, saying only that he'd served in the German army, U.S. attorney's office says.

Kumpf, who settled in Chicago with his family and worked for Vienna Sausage until 1990, said Tuesday he was never asked.

But people are supposed to tell the whole truth when they apply for citizenship, said Bernice Birnbaum of Milwaukee, who survived three years in a concentration camp before moving to the U.S.

"When we registered to go to America, they asked all types of questions," Birnbaum said. "We all said the same thing: the truth. Why didn't he tell the truth?"

Kumpf says the truth is that he served for a year and a half at Sachsenhausen in Germany and for a couple of days at Trawniki in Poland without hurting anyone.

According to a statement he gave government investigators, Kumpf served at Trawniki during a mass execution of prisoners Nov. 3, 1943. Close to 7,000 men, women and children were gunned down at the camp under a code name "Operation Harvest Festival," according to prosecutors.

The prosecutors say he worked at three other camps - Majdanek in Poland, and Buchenwald and Mittelbau in Germany.

Kumpf now lives with his daughter, who said neighbors have told her they oppose the U.S. government's efforts to deport him.

"I've been surprised by how sympathetic people have been", Anneliese Krampitz said Friday.

Neighbors contacted Friday declined to discuss Kumpf on the record.

The case against Kumpf is based on information gathered by the federal Office of Special Investigations. Since 1979, that office has stripped citizenship from 73 people who assisted the Nazis, according to the U.S. attorney's office. In one of the few other cases involving a Wisconsin man, a defense similar to Kumpf's didn't work.

In 1991, a federal judge ordered that a West Allis man be stripped of citizenship for serving as a guard at the Stutthof concentration camp in Poland even though there was no evidence that he killed anyone.

Amy Shapiro, a philosophy professor at Alverno College who serves as director of the Holocaust Education and Resource Center, says even though he's illiterate and frail, Kumpf should be deported.

"The fact is that he got into the U.S. illegally," she said. "He should have known entry . . . was conditioned on him not being involved with Nazi activities."

But Shapiro said the U.S. government has been at fault in the past, too:

"During the 1950s, the U.S. let in former Nazis to work on the space program and to help us fight the Russians in the Cold War."

Even today, some members of the Jewish community said they would be willing to bend the rules in certain cases.

Howard Melton, a 72-year-old Holocaust survivor who served in nine labor and concentration camps, says most of the guards he encountered were cruel and deserve no place in the U.S.

Except for one.

Toward the end of the war, Melton was in a labor camp in Bavaria. He says one guard was kind and would share news with the prisoners, such as when the Americans crossed the German border.

Melton says he believes that the guard was forced into the army and into the camp.

What if that guard was here in Wisconsin?

"I would welcome him into my own house," Melton said. "He was a human being."
"I know because it is impossible for a tape to hold the compression levels of these treble boosted MFSL's like Something/Anything. The metal particulate on the tape would shatter and all you'd hear is distortion if even that." - VD

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Postby lukpac » Thu May 12, 2005 9:27 am

The saga continues.

Ex-guard for Nazis citizenship revoked
80-year-old Caledonia man faces deportation
By MEGAN TWOHEY
mtwohey@journalsentinel.com
Posted: May 11, 2005

An 80-year-old Racine County man who has lived in the Midwest for nearly 50 years has been stripped of U.S. citizenship for his service as a guard at Nazi concentration camps.

A federal judge this week revoked the citizenship of Josias Kumpf on the grounds that it was granted in violation of the Refugee Relief Act of 1953, a law that barred people who had "personally advocated or assisted persecution" from entering the country. He may now be deported.

Kumpf, who didn't tell immigration officials of his service in the camps, only of his service in the German military, has argued that the law didn't apply to him because, by his account, he never shot or harmed anyone while serving as an SS guard.

But Judge Lynn Adelman of the U.S. District Court in Wisconsin sided with the federal Office of Special Investigations when he ruled that "a person who served as a guard at a camp or prison in which prisoners were subject to persecution 'personally advocated or assisted' in the persecution of those prisoners."
Admitted armed guard

Kumpf had admitted that he stood armed with a rifle in the guard towers at Sachsenhausen concentration camp near Berlin; on the perimeter of the killing pits at the SS labor camp in Trawniki, Poland; and at another forced labor camp in occupied France. He admitted being at Trawniki on one of the deadliest days of the Holocaust when 8,000 men, women and children were murdered as part of a slaughter code-named "Operation Harvest Festival."

"By virtue of such service," Adelman wrote in his decision, Kumpf "personally prevented prisoners from escaping."

His decision marks the 100th legal victory for the Office of Special Investigations, which has been working since 1979 to revoke citizenship of immigrants involved in Holocaust atrocities on the basis that they did not fully disclose their Nazi activities to immigration officials. Kumpf is at least the third person in Wisconsin to be targeted.

"The court's decision to revoke his U.S. citizenship has secured a measure of justice for the victims of that massacre and their families," said Eli M. Rosenbaum, the office's director.
Judge to determine status

Bernice Birnhaum, who survived three years in a concentration camp before being freed and moving to Milwaukee, agreed.

Unless it's appealed, the case will go into immigration court, where a judge will determine whether to deport Kumpf. Birnhaum said he should be forced to leave.

"The U.S. is too good for him," she said. "Let him suffer. I have no mercy for him."

Kumpf, a hunched man with a wrinkled face, emigrated from Austria to the United States with his wife and children in 1956. The family settled in Chicago, where Kumpf spent decades working as a sausage-maker.
Moved to Caledonia

Three years ago, Kumpf's wife died, and he moved to Caledonia to live with one of his daughters and her husband. He has a son who also lives in Caledonia, and other children who live in Milwaukee, Chicago and California.

If he's deported, Kumpf, who cannot read and write, will likely have the option of returning to Germany, because he is an ethnic German, or the city of his birth in the former Yugoslavia, which is now in Serbia and Montenegro.

He said Wednesday that he has a sister and brother in Germany but doesn't want to leave the care of his daughter.

"She's good to me, and I'm good to her," he said as he sat on a living room couch dressed in flannel shirts, sweatpants and slippers, watching daytime TV.

"If I have to go, I go," he said. "But I'd rather stay."
Appeal is unknown

Kumpf didn't know whether he would appeal the federal court decision, and his lawyer could not be reached for comment.

In 1990, a federal judge revoked the citizenship of Anton Tittjung, formerly of Greenfield, after the government discovered that he had served as a guard at Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria. He appealed all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, where he lost in 2000. Then 75, he was ordered deported to Croatia.

In 1991, the citizenship of Anton Baumann, formerly of West Allis, was revoked after a federal judge determined that he had served as a guard at the Stutthof concentration camp in Poland. An immigration judge ordered him deported to Germany but said Baumann, then 82, could stay in the U.S. until his ill health improved. It never did, and he died in 1994.
Ordered to stop prisoners

Kumpf, who says he was forced into the SS guard and feared that he would be shot if he left, described to the judge what he saw at Trawniki:

"I was watching them shoot some people and some of them come out and run away again. . . . Some people was shot and not good enough so they was still able to move, you know."

He said he was instructed to stop any prisoners who tried to escape, even if that meant killing them.

"After I finished with my breakfast, I have coffee on rye bread with butter, that's all I know. I get and then out, out, out, out, out, take your rifle and go and stay around and some of them move. I say what we have to watch, they say some of them are still halfway alive and they run out. So - and then I say if somebody come like that, shoot them to kill, shoot them to kill."

Kumpf said Wednesday he still thinks he did nothing wrong.

"I was a good boy," he insisted. "I never hurt anyone."

From the May 12, 2005, editions of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
"I know because it is impossible for a tape to hold the compression levels of these treble boosted MFSL's like Something/Anything. The metal particulate on the tape would shatter and all you'd hear is distortion if even that." - VD

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Postby dudelsack » Thu May 12, 2005 10:15 am

Not sure how I feel about this one. I didn't know there was an office in charge of hunting down old Nazis, though...jeez.