The Region - News from Dec. 26, 1986

Andrija Artukovic, the 87-year-old former Seal Beach man sentenced to death for the mass murders of civilians and prisoners while he was minister of police in a Nazi puppet state during World War II, lost an appeal for pardon by the nine-member Yugoslav state presidency in Belgrade. A lawyer for Artukovic said he will now ask the district court of Zagreb to suspend Artukovic’s death sentence because of his failing health. Artukovic, who entered the United States illegally in 1948, was extradited to Yugoslavia last Feb 12. After a monthlong public trial, he was found guilty of presiding over concentration camps in which more than 700,000 Jews, Gypsies, Serbs and Croats were killed. He has been sentenced to death by firing squad, but no execution date has been set.