Nazi hunter speaks to law students

There are many things one can do with a law degree: practice criminal law, practice business law, practice environmental law -- or hunt Nazi war criminals. This is what Eli Rosenbaum, principal deputy director of the Office of Special Investigations and a 1977 Wharton MBA recipient has chosen to do, and yesterday afternoon, he described his work to the Jewish Law Students Association. Established in 1979, the OSI is responsible for barring Nazi war criminals from entering the United States and finding, trying and convicting those who are already here. Rosenbaum said a lot of obstacles are presented both by the situation and the American judical system. "There are problems of proof because documents have been destroyed, the victims have been murdered and the survivors can't always identify," he said. He added that often the survivors are very few. "We are also faced with every delay tactic the U.S. Justice System has to offer," Rosenbaum continued, using the example of a man on trial for Nazi war crimes. "The man admitted to writing a document that sentenced hundreds of Jews to death, and the court took three years to come up with its decision," Rosenbaum said. He also described the process by which suspected Nazi war criminals are found and prosecuted. "We've been scouring the globe for suriving Nazi rosters," he said. "We then run names through data bases at Immigration and try to catch them. If they haven't changed their name too drastically, we can often match them." Once the OSI has found a suspected war criminal, it then tries to revoke his citizenship and have him deported. Rosenbaum added that Germany is very reluctant to try and convict them. "We've put a lot of pressure on Germany and Austria to take back these people," he said. "Since the Allied Trials, Germany has successfully prosecuted more than any other country. However, if it wasn't for the immense amount of international pressure, it wouldn't have gotten done." Rosenbaum also talked about the lenient American treatment of some Nazis during the war. He cited the instance of Arthur Rudolph, who was the operational director of a missile and weapons factory in Germany in which concentration camp victims were forced to work. Rudolph was brought to America by the United States Army. He ended up at NASA and built the rocket that put the first man on the moon. Rudolph was eventually brought up on charges, and left the United States in 1984. Rosenbaum mentioned the irony involved in the fact that the government that is working so hard to seek out and prosecute these war criminals did very little while these crimes were happening. "People often ask me why I bother when most of the people we prosecute are in their seventies and can't hurt anyone anymore," Rosenbaum said. "In my opinion, they aren't fit to walk on the same earth or breathe the same air as the survivors of these crimes. And we're going to continue this fight until there's nothing left to fight." "It's exciting to hear justice being done for justice's sake," said third-year Law student Alex Seldin.

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