Immigration officials dismiss Nazi camp guard's appeal, order him deported to Germany

A former Nazi concentration camp guard has lost his appeal to avoid deportation, the Department of Justice announced this week. Officials rejected his request to remain in the U.S. and ordered him to be deported to Germany, where he may face prosecution for camp-related crimes carried out during World War II.

German citizen Friedrich Berger was in February of this year ordered deported due to what an immigration judge called his "willing service as an armed guard of prisoners at a concentration camp where persecution took place." Berger was a guard at a sub-camp in the Neuengamme camp system in Germany.

The Board of Immigration Appeals this week struck down Berger's appeal on that ruling, according to the Justice Department. "War criminals and violators of human rights will not be allowed to evade justice and find safe haven here," ICE investigator Louis Rodi said in a statement.

The former guard participated in the forced evacuation of camp prisoners ahead of Allied advances in early 1945; during those marches, several dozen prisoners died.