NAZI FUGITIVE LINKED TO DRUG TRAFFICKING

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000404200040-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 6, 2010
• Sequence Number: 40
• Publication Date: February 27, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/06: CIA-RDP90-00552R000404200040-9
T i.FPr li(s~
STAT
WASHINGTON POST
27 February 1985
Nazi Fugitive Linked
To Drug Trafficking
Two Senators Release CIA Documents
By Bill Peterson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Josef Mengele, the Nazi doctor
known as the "Angel of Death" at'
the Auschwitz concentration camp,
may have been "heavily involved in
narcotics traffic" from his home in
Paraguay in the 1970s, according to
CIA documents released yesterday.
The declassified material shows
that Mengele,' the most notorious
accused Nazi war criminal believed
to be still at large, traveled freely in
South America, did not try to hide
his identity, and may have lived un-
der the protection of Paraguayan
President Alfredo Stroessner.
The Central Intelligence Agency
began receiving reports of Men-
gele's alleged involvement in drug
trafficking in 1972, and as recently
as 1979 it asked other federal agen-
cies if they had any information on
Mengele, wanted for prosecution in
West Germany and Israel. __ _
Sens. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) and
Alfonse M. D'Amato (R-N.Y.), who
released the documents, charged
that federal officials failed to follow
up leads about Mengele and asked
the U.S. government to lead a
worldwide hunt for him. . -
Nazi atrocities are "a chapter in
history that the United States
wants to sweep under the rug,"
Specter said. "Nobody really gives a
damn about Nazi war criminals."
Mengele, who would be- 73 if
alive, was a physician and former
major in the Nazi secret police who
allegedly sent thousands of concen-
tration-camp prisoners to ' their
deaths in gas chambers and used
others, including many children, in
painful medical experiments.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center in
Los Angeles has offered a $1 mil-
lion reward for information ieading
to his capture and extradition.
The 28 pages of heavily-censored
CIA documents provide many`fas-
cinating glimpses of Mengele's life,
but it is difficult. to determine how
much of the information is credibt&
or is hearsay. . . sl
gele arrived in Paraguay for
first time it 1951 and lived alter4
nately there and in, Brazil, Argen-
tina and' Uruguay, working at times
as a salesman for a 'West German
farm-machinery firm owned by 'his
family, and as an auto mechan16IN
Mengele "never tried" to hide :l
identity in his early years in
America and in 1959 -was nat
ized as a Paraguayan, citizen undei
his own name, another document
said. In 1970 the CIA reported ri
mors that Mengele lived at a well-
guarded ranch in eastern Paraguay
"protected by Stroessner."
One source told the CIA that
Mengele underwent plastic surgery
in -1974 and "looks much- younger
than his age," a document said. The
same source said that, in 1968;
Mengele lived with Martin Bor=
mann, Adolf Hitler's designated
successor, widely believed to have
died in Berlin in 1945.
Another source who reportedly
knew Mengele well told the CIA
that Mengele was,"a nice person;
who provided free medical care.
Mengele apparently was first
brought to CIA attention by a "petty
criminal," who told them Mengele,
using the name Dr. Henrique Wolf-
man, lived on a farm near Encar-
nacion, Paraguay, and was "heavily
involved in narcotics traffic."
In 1979, the CIA's Strategic Nar-
cotics Team submitted an article-to
the International Narcotics Revievur
mentioning the drug reports. The
article was withdrawn because it
was based on very circumstantial,
evidence, according to a CIA memo:
STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/06: CIA-RDP90-00552R000404200040-9