The World - News from April 3, 1987

Israel’s Supreme Court rejected an appeal by lawyers defending accused Nazi war criminal John Demjanjuk that the three judges at his seven-week-old trial should be disqualified for bias. The defense had accused the judges of repeatedly objecting to its questions, but Supreme Court President Meir Shamgar declared the claim unwarranted. “The court has acted toward the defense with patience and tolerance,” he concluded. Last week, the judges had threatened to evict defense lawyer Yoram Sheftel after he suggested that the proceedings were a show trial. Demjanjuk is accused of being the sadistic guard “Ivan the Terrible” at the Treblinka death camp.