## Facts

- Jonas Stelmokas, a Lithuanian-born naturalized U.S. citizen, obtained entry to the United States in 1949 as a displaced person and became a citizen in 1955.
- The United States alleged he had served as an officer in the Lithuanian army and then voluntarily joined and served as an officer in the Nazi-sponsored 3rd Lithuanian Schutzmannschaft Battalion beginning in July 1941.
- The Schutzmannschaft battalion functioned as an armed auxiliary police force organized to assist German occupation authorities in persecuting Jews and other civilians.
- The district court found Stelmokas commanded a detachment guarding the Kaunas Jewish ghetto while residents were subjected to extreme deprivation, brutality, and arbitrary shootings, and that he enforced confinement under those conditions.
- The district court found he was on duty when the battalion participated in the October 28, 1941 “Grosse Aktion,” during which Nazi records reported approximately 9,200 Jews, including thousands of children, were shot in roughly a day.
- As German forces retreated in 1944, he joined the German Luftwaffe and served in a light flak replacement unit.
- In displaced-person and visa interviews, Stelmokas represented that he had been a teacher and laborer and omitted his Schutzmannschaft and Luftwaffe service; authorities certified and issued his visa based on those accounts.
- The government filed a civil action under 8 U.S.C. § 1451(a) to revoke his naturalization, asserting his citizenship was illegally procured and obtained through willful misrepresentation and concealment of disqualifying conduct and affiliations.
- After a bench trial, the district court revoked his naturalization on six of seven counts, relying heavily on wartime and postwar archival documents and expert testimony about their provenance and meaning.

## Issues

1. Whether the district court properly authenticated and admitted wartime and postwar archival documents, including foreign and Eastern-bloc records, under Federal Rules of Evidence 901 and 803(16).
2. Whether the government proved by clear, unequivocal, and convincing evidence that Stelmokas’s naturalization was illegally procured and/or procured by willful, material misrepresentations and concealments.
3. Whether Stelmokas’s service in a persecutory Nazi-sponsored unit and his concealment of that service rendered him ineligible for a displaced-person visa and therefore ineligible for lawful naturalization.

## Decision

- The Third Circuit affirmed the judgment revoking Stelmokas’s citizenship.
- The court held the government met its heavy denaturalization burden with clear, unequivocal, and convincing proof that Stelmokas’s naturalization was illegally procured and procured through willful misrepresentation and concealment.
- The court held the district court did not err in admitting and relying on archival records supported by expert testimony and circumstantial indicia of authenticity under Rule 901.
- The court approved admission of authenticated documents as “ancient documents” under Rule 803(16).

## Legal Principles

- Denaturalization requires the government to prove its case by clear, unequivocal, and convincing evidence that does not leave the issue in doubt.
- A naturalization is “illegally procured” if the defendant was statutorily ineligible for admission or citizenship at the time it was granted.
- Willful, material misrepresentations or concealments in visa or naturalization processes support revocation when truthful disclosure would have had a natural tendency to influence the government’s decision.
- Under Rule 901(a), authentication is satisfied by evidence sufficient to support a finding that an item is what the proponent claims; circumstantial features and expert testimony may establish authenticity for archival records.
- Under Rule 803(16), statements in authenticated documents at least 20 years old are admissible despite hearsay objections.
- Voluntary service in a Nazi-sponsored persecutory unit, coupled with enforcement activity at sites of persecution, can support a finding of assistance in persecution and consequent ineligibility for entry and naturalization.

## Conclusion

The Third Circuit upheld revocation of Stelmokas’s citizenship because the government proved, with the required heightened certainty, that he voluntarily served in a Nazi-sponsored persecutory battalion and then obtained his visa and naturalization by willfully concealing that service; it also confirmed that foreign archival records may be authenticated through expert and circumstantial proof and admitted as ancient documents.


United States v. Stelmokas, 100 F.3d 302 (3d Cir. 1996)