German court rejects bid to bar deceased ex-guard’s testimony from Demjanjuk trial

Court rejects bid to bar testimony on Demjanjuk

MUNICH — A German court trying John Demjanjuk has rejected a defense plea not to admit statements made by a now-deceased guard at the Nazis’ Sobibor death camp.

The 90-year-old Demjanjuk is standing trial on 28,060 counts of accessory to murder on allegations he was a guard at the camp in occupied Poland. He denies that.

Defense lawyer Ulrich Busch argued Tuesday the court shouldn’t read statements by Sobibor guard Ignat Danilchenko. Danilchenko allegedly told Soviet authorities he remembered Demjanjuk from Sobibor.

Busch says the statements may have been extracted through torture and Danilchenko is not alive to be cross-examined.

Judges rejected his motions, saying they’d read the evidence into the record before deciding on its credibility.