QCTimes.com - Chicago man stripped of U.S. citizenship for aiding Nazis in World War II

A retired carpenter who has lived in this country for more than 50 years was stripped of his U.S. citizenship Tuesday for taking part in a police organization that helped the Nazis in rounding up Ukrainian Jews during World War II. Osyp Firishchak, 86, of Chicago faces probable deportation proceedings under an order issued by U.S. District Judge Samuel Der-Yeghiayan. In his 53-page decision, Der-Yeghiayan accused Firishchak of lying at a three-day civil trial when he denied he was a member of the Ukrainian Auxiliary Police, which helped the Nazis as they arrested Jews in large numbers. Firishchak, who came to the United States in 1949, testified earlier this month that he was not a member of the police organization, but was a homeless vagrant during the years when investigators say he helped the Nazis. He also contended his name, which appears on auxiliary police documents staring in 1941, was a common one in Ukraine. Der-Yeghiayan said the Justice Department’s Office of Special Investigations — the federal government’s Nazi hunters — proved Firishchak “was a participant in an organization that perpetrated some of the most horrific acts against human decency ever known in history.”