Among cases that are found at the margin of the “strange” genre (and so are often included in lists of paranormal phenomena) are varying types of “hidden identity,” which present varying degrees of difficulty to expose.

Some whimsical impostures are inadvertently exposed. For instance, young Deborah Sampson (1760–1827), prompted by a desire for adventure, assumed a false identity as Private Robert Shurtleff and served bravely for a year and a half in the Continental Army until she was hospitalized with a fever, which resulted in her unmasking. Honorably discharged, she soon married, raised three children, and published a narrative of her life, The Female Review, in 1797 (Nickell 2005, 34).

Again, stage magician William Ellsworth Robinson (1861–1918) sought to capitalize on the popularity of a Chinese conjurer who had toured America. Adopting a similar name, “Chung Ling Soo,” and donning appropriate costume and makeup, he entertained western audiences with his oriental-style wizardry for eighteen years—even maintaining his disguise offstage and speaking to reporters only through an interpreter. His imposture was tragically revealed: he was mortally wounded while performing magic’s notorious “Bullet-Catching Trick.” Doctors attempting to save his life discovered that his skin coloring did not extend below the neck or above the forearms (Nickell 2005, 34)!

Among my most significant cases was that of accused Nazi death camp guard Ivan “John” Demjanjuk. The question of the authenticity of an SS identification card photo (see Figure 1) was a life-or-death one when I was brought into the case by his desperate family. He had been sentenced to be executed in Israel, having been convicted of being the notorious “Ivan the Terrible” at the Treblinka concentration camp.

Many ‘Ivans’

In Poland, east of Warsaw, the Nazis operated a group of camps for the extermination of Jews—Belzec, Treblinka, and Sobibor—together with an SS facility, Trawniki, where death camp guards were trained. Most of the guards were Ukrainian prisoners of war who volunteered for the grisly work. One such member of the Trawniki unit was a brawny twenty-two-year-old motor mechanic and driver named Ivan Demjanjuk (Nickell 2005, 38).

There were, however, various men named Ivan in the unit, and they were shifted from camp to camp. As Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz explains:

Back in 1987, after attending several sessions of the Demjanjuk trial in Jerusalem, I publicly stated that I would not be surprised if there were several Ivan the Terribles at Treblinka. Most of the guards at Treblinka were Ukrainians, and Ivan—Ukrainian for John—is the most common Ukrainian name. Any brutal guard named Ivan would be called Ivan the Terrible. (Dershowitz 1991)

Indeed, Treblinka survivor Yehiel Reichman testified, as Demjanjuk’s defense attorneys had argued, that there were no fewer than six Ivans at Treblinka, where the man dubbed “Ivan Grozny,” or “Ivan the Terrible,” was stationed. Some said that Ivan Grozny was a ranking officer; others said he was a train driver or watchtower guard. The greatest number, though, said that he was the sadistic guard who operated the gas chamber motor and who took delight in hacking off an ear or breast or splitting skulls with an iron pipe that he brandished (Teicholz 1990, 29, 120, 277, 278; Nickell 2005, 38).

Adding to the uncertainty surrounding the many Ivans, Demjanjuk’s defense attorney attempted to make a case that a Nazi criminal named Alfred Blitz had been at Treblinka from June 1942 to September 1943, had committed acts like those eyewitnesses attributed to Ivan the Terrible, and was even called Ivan. To the Jews forced to work at Treblinka, the true names of the various Ivans would not have been known, and in their uniforms, many of the Ukrainians may have looked alike. A further difficulty stems from the fact that the so-called work-Jews at Treblinka were not permitted to look into Ivan’s eyes (Teicholz 1990, 11, 121, 207; Ryan 1984, 101).

In the case of Demjanjuk, what is known is that he lied about his Nazi past upon immigrating to the United States and repeatedly gave what the Associated Press termed “contradictions in his testimony about his whereabouts during the war” (“Defense” 1987). An American judge who, on June 30, 1993, upheld Demjanjuk’s 1986 deportation from the United States, said:

Mr. Demjanjuk’s alibi was so incredible as to legitimately raise the suspicions of his prosecutors that he lied about everything—including his denial that he was Ivan the Terrible. The principal effect of his lie … was merely to confirm the prosecutors’ suspicions that they were on the right track. (“Deportation” 1993)

Nazi ID card

Although I would actually come to find further evidence of Demjanjuk’s guilt, he was finally acquitted in 1993 by the Israeli Supreme Court as a result of newly discovered evidence. Statements by former Treblinka death camp guards had been discovered, wherein each man—interrogated by the Soviet KGB and convicted of war crimes—claimed that Ivan the Terrible was not Ivan “John” Demjanjuk but one Ivan Marchenko. Yet even this evidence proved less credible than it first appeared. Meanwhile, at one point Alan Dershowitz remarked that Demjanjuk was “Ivan the Less Terrible.”

The unrefuted evidence against Demjanjuk remained powerful. It included his positive identification by a fellow guard at the Sobibor death camp and documentary evidence placing him as a guard at two other camps (though not at Treblinka). Demjanjuk also admitted to having had an SS tattoo removed, with no credible explanation of why he had such a tattoo in the first place (Nickell 2005, 39). The most incriminating evidence, however, was an SS identification card bearing his apparent photograph and signature. But was the card authentic?

In 1987, I assembled a team of experts to compare the questioned photo with known photographs of Demjanjuk (e.g., from a 1947 driver’s license) using a variety of approaches. Forensic analyst John F. Fischer applied a superimposition technique; forensic anthropologist Virginia Smith found similar skull structures, including a similarly enlarged right orbit (eye socket); and ear expert Alfred V. Iannarelli concluded that the ears in the questioned and known photos matched. (Our other experts also agreed on additional specific points of matching [Nickell 2005, 42–44].)

The questioned photograph was also determined to lack any signs of alteration—either evidence of photographic retouching or tampering with the facial features or the clothing. Our forensic review additionally supported the previous detailed study conducted for the Israeli prosecution using measurements of eleven facial landmarks (Nickell 1994, 90–96).

My Testimony

Other evidence supported the matching photographs. The signatures on the card were authentic (as determined by expert examination), and the information on the card was corroborated by other documents. Importantly, the card precisely matched genuine SS identity cards. I was able to match the questioned Demjanjuk card to other such cards for other guards in terms of having identical printing flaws. Again, other experts showed further important matching—for example, its typewritten portions having been done on a 1930-series Olympia 12 machine, as on other cards (Nickell 2005, 46).

Although Demjanjuk’s family understandably dropped my service, my work on the case enhanced my profile, especially among document experts. Two who had testified in the case in Israel were kind enough to invite me to their laboratories in Washington, D.C.: Dr. Antonio Cantu of the U.S. Secret Service and Gideon Epstein of the Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization. I recall Cantu showing me that the Secret Service had acquired my book Pen, Ink and Evidence for their library, and he and I subsequently kept in touch on some other matters.

This was also true of Epstein, and it helped lead to my further involvement in the case. In 2000, I was visited by two agents from the U.S. Office of Special Investigations (OSI), and they brought greetings from Epstein, whom I deduced had recommended me. I was happy to share my files. (Indeed, I had a videotape of Demjanjuk in his Israeli jail cell that the OSI had been unable to obtain. I let them take it to make a copy, and they soon returned it.)

The OSI agents took down my testimony regarding my findings in the case. This would be part of a new trial in the United States—not for Demjanjuk’s war crimes but to revoke his citizenship for having lied about his Nazi past upon entering the country. My resulting affidavit of October 5, 2000, was for the United States District Court for the Northern Division of Ohio, Eastern Division. That trial was held in 2001. On February 21, 2002, the federal judge revoked the eighty-one-year-old Demjanjuk’s United States citizenship. He was subsequently deported to Germany (Nickell 2005, 50).

The Final Trial

Demjanjuk was tried and convicted of war crimes—specifically 27,900 counts of accessory to murder. On May 12, 2011, he was sentenced to five years in prison with credit for two years served. He was released from custody pending appeal but then died at a home for the elderly on March 17, 2012. Because he died before his appeal was heard, he is presumed not guilty under German law (“John Demjanjuk” 2022).

That technicality notwithstanding, it is clear that Demjanjuk was one of the Nazi SS’s roving Ivan the Terribles. At the very least—even if one does not accept the evidence that he was among the Ivans of Treblinka—he was certainly Ivan the Bloody of Sobibor.

With him showing not a hint of contrition or willingness to admit wrongdoing, it is important to remember the overwhelming evidence: the best that could be said in Demjanjuk’s defense is that he was innocent of killing Jews at one death camp because he was participating in killing Jews at another.

References

Defense witnesses “self-destruct.” 1987. Louisville Courier-Journal (August 24).

Deportation upheld for man convicted of Nazi war crimes. 1993. Lexington Herald-Leader, Lexington, Kentucky (July 1).

Dershowitz, Alan. 1991. Candidate Buchanan picks an odd “hero” to champion. Rocky Mt. News (October 22).

John Demjanjuk. 2022. Online at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Demjanjuk; accessed January 31, 2022.

Nickell, Joe. 1994. Camera Clues: A Handbook for Photographic Investigation. Lexington, KY: The University Press of Kentucky.

———. 2005. Unsolved History: Investigating Mysteries of the Past. Lexington, KY: The University Press of Kentucky. (The present article is largely adapted from this source. See also, Nickell 2009, 155–157.)

———. 2009. Real or Fake: Studies in Authentication. Lexington, KY: The University Press of Kentucky.

Ryan, Alan Jr. 1984. Quiet Neighbors: Prosecuting Nazi War Criminals in America. New York, NY: Harcourt.

Teicholz, Tom. 1990. The Trial of Ivan the Terrible. New York, NY: St. Martin’s Press.