Demjanjuk to be deported during weekend

CLEVELAND, April 3 (UPI) -- The Cleveland-area man accused of helping to kill 29,000 people at a Nazi death camp in Poland will be deported to Germany this weekend, officials said.

John Demjanjuk, 89, is scheduled to leave Sunday and arrive in Germany Monday to face charges that he walked Jews from rail cars to the gas chambers at the Sobibor camp in Nazi-occupied Poland, The Plain Dealer newspaper in Cleveland reported Friday.

A doctor and a nurse will accompany him on the flight, said his Munich attorney, Guenther Maull. Demjanjuk's family said the retired autoworker is too ill to stand trial.

Demjanjuk is expected to meet with prosecutors about the charges when he arrives in Germany, then be hospitalized or jailed until the trial starts, possibly in six months, Maull told The Plain Dealer. The trial itself could last as long, depending on Demjanjuk's health, the lawyer said.

"Given his current medical condition, he will not endure the stress of what the Germans have planned," John Demjanjuk Jr. said via e-mail to The Plain Dealer.

Demjanjuk filed an emergency motion Thursday in U.S. Immigration Court in Arlington, Va., to stop the deportation, alleging it would amount to torture because of his age, deteriorating physical and mental health.

Filing an appeal doesn't halt the deportation, an immigration attorney in Cleveland said to the newspaper. An immigration judge or a U.S. District Court judge must rule to postpone the deportation.