Demjanjuk family appeals German decision to close death probe

Investigation would examine medication administered to convicted war criminal before his March death

JTA – The family of John Demjanjuk appealed the decision by German prosecutors to close an investigation into the convicted Nazi war criminal’s death.

Prosecutors in the German state of Bavaria late last month determined that Demjanjuk’s death was not hastened by medication administered at a nursing home in Bavaria. Demjanjuk died while awaiting an appeal of his conviction last year by a Munich court for his role in the murder of 27,900 people at the Sobibor camp in Poland.

Ulrich Busch, an attorney for Demjanjuk, filed an appeal on Tuesday that said the decision contradicts “all medical knowledge” about the drug Novalgin, which was used to treat Demjanjuk, according to the Associated Press. The drug is common in Germany but banned in the United States and other countries.

Busch had filed a complaint in May with German prosecutors asking them to open an investigation of five doctors and a nurse, alleging that the pain medication they gave to Demjanjuk added to his kidney problems. Demjanjuk died in March at 91.