II 

111TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION S. 1704 

To hold the surviving Nazi war criminals accountable for the war crimes, 

genocide, and crimes against humanity they committed during World 

War II, by encouraging foreign governments to more efficiently prosecute 

and extradite wanted criminals. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

SEPTEMBER 24, 2009 

Mr. NELSON of Florida (for himself, Ms. SNOWE, and Mr. CARDIN) introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary 

A BILL 

To hold the surviving Nazi war criminals accountable for 

the war crimes, genocide, and crimes against humanity 

they committed during World War II, by encouraging 

foreign governments to more efficiently prosecute and 

extradite wanted criminals. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘World War II War 

5 Crimes Accountability Act of 2009’’. 

6 SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 

7 Congress finds the following: 


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1 (1) Surviving Nazi war criminals are becoming 

2 increasingly rare. 

3 (2) The identities of many of the remaining 

4 criminals were made known only after the end of the 

5 Cold War and the collapse of Communist govern6 ments throughout eastern Europe. 

7 (3) In most of these formerly communist coun8 tries, the volume of available information is enor9 mous, and the available resources to study it and 

10 identify war crimes suspects is comparatively small. 

11 (4) In the United States, the Office of Special 

12 Investigations (OSI) of the Department of Justice is 

13 responsible for detecting, investigating and taking 

14 legal action to denaturalize or deport persons who 

15 took part in Nazi-sponsored acts of persecution com16 mitted abroad between 1933 and 1945. 

17 (5) As of April 2009, OSI had successfully 

18 prosecuted more than 107 people involved in Nazi 

19 war crimes who were residing in the United States. 

20 (6) As a government office with limited re21 sources, OSI is under enormous strain to identify 

22 and prosecute those criminals identified by newly re23 leased records before it is too late. 

24 (7) Some foreign governments hinder the ef25 forts of OSI, Congress, and the United States GovVerDate Nov 24 2008 04:36 Sep 25, 2009 Jkt 079200 PO 00000 Frm 00002 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1704.IS S1704

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1 ernment to extradite or deport convicted Nazi war 

2 criminals from the United States to their country of 

3 origin or other relevant jurisdiction. 

4 (8) Certain nongovernmental organizations have 

5 been instrumental in the search for wanted Nazi war 

6 crimes suspects for over 60 years. 

7 (9) Simon Wiesenthal, a survivor of the Nazi 

8 death camps whose work stands as a reminder and 

9 a warning for future generations, dedicated his life 

10 to— 

11 (A) documenting the crimes of the Holo12 caust; and 

13 (B) hunting down the perpetrators still at 

14 large. 

15 (10) As founder and head of the Jewish Docu16 mentation Center in Vienna, Simon Wiesenthal suc17 cessfully brought to justice wanted Nazi war crimi18 nals, including Franz Stangl, the commandant of 

19 the Treblinka death camp. 

20 (11) Mr. Wiesenthal’s work, which contributed 

21 enormously to the modern understanding of justice, 

22 war crimes, and crimes against humanity, should be 

23 continued. 

24 (12) In 2002, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, in 

25 collaboration with the Targum Shlishi Foundation of 


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1 Miami, Florida, launched Operation: Last Chance to 

2 maximize the identification and help facilitate the 

3 prosecution of the remaining unprosecuted Nazi war 

4 criminals, helping to achieve justice for the victims 

5 of the Holocaust. 

6 (13) Of the most guilty Nazis and Nazi collabo7 rators still at large, Operation: Last Chance has 

8 identified the following suspects: 

9 (A) Dr. Aribert Heim, who served as a 

10 medical doctor at the Sachsenhausen, Buchen11 wald, and Mauthausen concentration camps, is 

12 the most wanted ex-Nazi still at large. His most 

13 terrible crimes were committed at Mauthausen, 

14 where he murdered hundreds of inmates by ad15 ministering lethal injections of phenol to their 

16 hearts or by other torturous killing methods 

17 during the fall of 1941. Press reports indicate 

18 that he may have died in Cairo, Egypt in 1992, 

19 but serious doubts remain about the veracity of 

20 that information. If he is alive, his current 

21 whereabouts are unknown. 

22 (B) Dr. Sandor Ke ́piro ́, who served as an 

23 officer in the Hungarian gendarmerie, was 1 of 

24 several Hungarian officers convicted in 1944 

25 for the mass murder of several thousand civilVerDate Nov 24 2008 04:36 Sep 25, 2009 Jkt 079200 PO 00000 Frm 00004 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1704.IS S1704

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1 ians (mostly Jews) in the city of Novi Sad on 

2 January 23, 1942. In the wake of the occupa3 tion of Hungary in March 1944, he was par4 doned, promoted, and returned to active service. 

5 He escaped to Austria in 1945, fled to Argen6 tina in 1948, and returned to Hungary in 1996. 

7 (C) Milivoj Asner, who served as the police 

8 chief of the city of Slavonska Pozega. During 

9 1941 and 1942, Mr. Asner orchestrated the 

10 robbery, persecution and destruction of the local 

11 Serb, Jewish and Gypsy communities, which 

12 culminated in the deportation of hundreds of ci13 vilians to Ustasha concentration camps, where 

14 most of the deportees were murdered. After his 

15 exposure in Operation: Last Chance, the former 

16 police chief later escaped once again to 

17 Klagenfurt, Austria, where he currently resides. 

18 (D) Charles Zentai is accused of mur19 dering 18-year-old Peter Balazs, a Jewish boy 

20 he caught riding a Budapest tram without the 

21 requisite yellow star on November 8, 1944. 

22 Zentai was able to immigrate to Australia in 

23 February 1950, where he currently lives. Hun24 gary is seeking his extradition. 


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1 (E) Algimantas Dailide, who volunteered 

2 for Lithuania’s secret police, Saugumas, ar3 rested 10 Jews and 2 Poles, including women 

4 and children, who were attempting to escape 

5 from the Vilnius ghetto in October 1941 and 

6 turned them over to the Nazis for likely execu7 tion. After Mr. Dailide’s deportation from the 

8 United States to Germany, the Lithuanian 

9 courts convicted him for his crimes in 2006, but 

10 refused to imprison him on medical grounds. 

11 He currently resides in Kirchberg, Germany. 

12 (F) Harry Mannil is accused of playing a 

13 role in the death of at least 7 Jews and Com14 munists while serving in the Estonian police in 

15 1941 and 1942 during the Nazi occupation of 

16 Estonia. Although Estonian prosecutors have 

17 claimed on multiple occasions, most recently in 

18 2006, that they had uncovered no evidence 

19 proving Mr. Mannil’s guilt of war crimes, they 

20 discovered that the 7 people he interrogated 

21 were later executed. Mr. Mannil is living in 

22 Venezuela and is barred from entering the 

23 United States. 

24 (G) Mikhail Gorshkow is alleged to have 

25 been an interrogator for the Nazi Gestapo and 


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1 is accused of helping kill about 3,000 men, 

2 women, and children in the Slutsk ghetto in 

3 Minsk, Belarus. He was stripped of his United 

4 States citizenship and ordered deported for con5 cealing his wartime service for the Nazis. He is 

6 under investigation in Estonia. 

7 (H) Alois Brunner, a key operative of 

8 Adolf Eichmann, was responsible for the depor9 tation of 47,000 Jews from Austria, 44,000 

10 Jews from Greece, 23,500 Jews from France, 

11 and 14,000 Jews from Slovakia to Nazi death 

12 camps. He lived in Syria for decades and the 

13 Syrian government refused to cooperate with 

14 international prosecution efforts. He was con15 victed in absentia for his crimes by France. He 

16 was born in 1912 and last seen in 2001. While 

17 is it doubtful that he is still alive, there is no 

18 conclusive evidence of his death. 

19 SEC. 3. SENSE OF THE SENATE. 

20 It is the sense of the Senate that— 

21 (1) the United States should actively encourage 

22 extradition and prosecution of the remaining Nazi 

23 war criminals (as described in section 212(a)(3)(E) 

24 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 

25 1182 (a)(3)(E))); 


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1 (2) the Simon Wiesenthal Center should be 

2 commended for its historic work in bringing to light 

3 the atrocities of the Holocaust and in advancing jus4 tice for Nazi war criminals through Operation: Last 

5 Chance; and 

6 (3) the Office of Special Investigation of the 

7 Department of Justice is advancing the declared for8 eign policy of the United States by bringing wanted 

9 World War II criminals to justice and should be 

10 commended for its actions. 

11 SEC. 4. DESIGNATION OF VISA WAIVER PROGRAM COUN12 TRIES. 

13 (a) COOPERATION.—After a country is initially des14 ignated as a visa waiver program country under section 

15 217(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 

16 1187(c)), the Attorney General, in evaluating the effect 

17 that such designation would have on the law enforcement 

18 and security interests of the United States under para19 graph (2)(C) of such section, shall consider the extent to 

20 which such country is cooperating in— 

21 (1) extraditing or prosecuting wanted or in22 dicted Nazi war criminals to the relevant jurisdic23 tion; and 

24 (2) admitting into their territory aliens de25 scribed in section 212(a)(3)(E)(i) and ordered reVerDate Nov 24 2008 04:36 Sep 25, 2009 Jkt 079200 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1704.IS S1704

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1 moved from the United States by a United States 

2 immigration judge, the Board of Immigration Ap3 peals, or a Federal court. 

4 (b) PRESIDENTIAL DISCRETION.— 

5 (1) IN GENERAL.—If the President determines 

6 that it would not be in the national interest of the 

7 United States to terminate a country’s designation 

8 as a visa waiver program country based on the eval9 uation under subsection (a), the President may de10 cline to terminate such designation after providing 

11 advance written notification to— 

12 (A) the Committee on Foreign Relations of 

13 the Senate; 

14 (B) the Committee on the Judiciary of the 

15 Senate; 

16 (C) the Committee on Foreign Affairs of 

17 the House of Representatives; and 

18 (D) the Committee on the Judiciary of the 

19 House of Representatives. 

20 (2) CONTENTS.—In providing notification 

21 under paragraph (1), the President shall— 

22 (A) identify each crime suspect described 

23 in subsection (a)(2) whose admission has not 

24 been effected; and 


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1 (B) submit copies of all decisions rendered 

2 by United States immigration judges, the 

3 Board of Immigration Appeals, and Federal 

4 courts that relate to such crime suspects. 

5 SEC. 5. ANNUAL REPORT. 

6 In each of the fiscal years 2010 through 2014, the 

7 President shall submit an annual report to the committees 

8 listed in section 4(b)(1), which describes, for each country 

9 that has a pending application for entry into or renewal 

10 of the visa waiver program, whether such country is— 

11 (1) cooperating satisfactorily in extraditing or 

12 deporting wanted Nazi war crimes suspects to the 

13 jurisdiction in which they have been indicted or con14 victed; 

15 (2) prosecuting wanted Nazi war crimes sus16 pects effectively within such country’s jurisdiction; 

17 and 

18 (3) cooperating satisfactorily in admitting to 

19 the territory of such country aliens described in sec20 tion 212(a)(3)(E)(i) and ordered removed from the 

21 United States territory by a United States immigra22 tion judge, the Board of Immigration Appeals, or a 

23 Federal court. 

Æ 


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