CLEVELAND (JTA) — An accused war criminal is set to go on trial here next week, more than two years after the Nazi-fighting arm of the U.S. Justice Department began denaturalization proceedings.
Algimantas Dailide, 75, a resident of nearby Brecksville, is accused of taking part in the persecution of Jews while serving during World War II in the Saugumas, the Nazi-sponsored Lithuanian security police.
He is set to appear Monday in U.S. District Court before Judge Paul Matia.
Dailide is accused of working for a department of the Saugumas that identified and captured suspected Communists, Jews living in hiding or on false papers and non-Jews who hid, helped or did business with Jews.
The six-count complaint filed by the Justice Department’s Office of Special Investigations in December 1994 charged that Dailide was ineligible to immigrate to the United States because he assisted in the Nazi program of persecution and purposely concealed his wartime activity on his immigration application.
Dailide fled to Germany in October 1944 and came to the United States in 1950, after receiving displaced person status. He was naturalized in September 1955.
He stated on an application that during the war years he worked as a “practitioner forester.”