Ex-Nazi’s War Crimes ‘Undoubtedly Proved’ : Artukovic’s Death Sentence Is Upheld

This country’s federal court Tuesday upheld the death sentence for former Nazi Police Minister Andrija Artukovic, a former Seal Beach resident, convicted of mass murders during World War II.

The five-member Yugoslav Federal Court in Belgrade issued a statement confirming the sentence of death by firing squad for Artukovic for his alleged involvement in the murders of thousands of civilians and prisoners of war during 1941-45.

“It has been undoubtedly proved that Andrija Artukovic had committed war crimes,” the court announcement said.

But Artukovic’s son, Radoslav, in Los Angeles, vowed to continue efforts to free his 86-year-old father, who suffers from Alzheimer’s disease and other ailments. The younger Artukovic, who lives in Seal Beach, called the decision “an injustice” and said his attorneys would seek a reversal of the sentence or a new trial.

The elder Artukovic, who lived in Seal Beach for 36 years before being extradited to Yugoslavia last February, was the police minister for the Nazis’ puppet Croatian government during World War II. Yugoslav authorities claim that more than 700,000 Jews, Serbs, Gypsies and Croats died in concentration camps during Artukovic’s tenure.

Trial Was Unfair

Artukovic was sentenced to death by a Yugoslav court on May 14, but his son said his father had not received a fair trial.

“It’s a kangaroo court,” Radoslav Artukovic said Tuesday. “There is no such thing as a fair trial over there.”

He added, however, that the Yugoslavian court now must answer in writing all the arguments in the appeal it denied Tuesday. After that document is received, probably within two weeks, a petition for a new trial will be filed, Radoslav Artukovic said.

“The charade will then be there in black and white for everyone to see. He was extradited for crimes that never occurred, or that he had nothing to do with. He was not allowed to put on his defense,” Radoslav Artukovic said.

Andrija Artukovic was extradited to Yugoslavia through the help of the U.S. Office of Special Investigations, which the son claimed “willfully collaborated (with the Yugoslavs) in perpetrating a fraud.”

“We’ll try to get the U.S. Justice Department to stop its cover-up of the OSI and the fraud that occurred in Los Angeles last year,” when Artukovic was ordered extradited to Yugoslavia, he said. “We’ll also ask that the United States stop all extradition cooperation with the Yugoslavian government.”

One of the arguments in the appeal to the Yugoslav Federal Court was that Artukovic was incapable of understanding the original trial because of his age and poor health.

Mentally Deteriorating

His son, who attended the trial in Belgrade but has not had any communication with his father, said Artukovic is “hanging in physically. But mentally, he is deteriorating.”

The younger Artukovic said he will not be surprised if his father is executed. But he added that he is committed to publicizing what he called the injustice of his father’s extradition and trial.

“I hope that by articulating this enough, people will take an interest to find out exactly what happened,” he said. “At some point in time, the public will realize that this 86-year-old man will have been executed for something that was a complete fabrication by communist Yugoslavia.”

Times staff writer Ray Perez contributed to this report from Orange County.