Whether an 83-year-old Butler Township resident will have his citizenship revoked with the possibility of deportation to his native Lithuania is at the heart of settlement negotiations between lawyers for Ildefonsas Bucmys and the U.S. Department of Justice, according to U.S. District Judge Walter H. Rice.

Negotiations between the parties are “close to all or nothing,” he said.

Bucmys is accused of concealing his service in a Nazi-controlled Lithuanian national police force and his service as an armed guard at Majdanek concentration camp in Lublin, Poland on his 1992 application for naturalization as a U.S. citizen, as well as during his naturalization interview.

On Sept. 5, 2002, the Justice Department sued to revoke Bucmys’ citizenship.
Although Rice and Bucmys’ lawyer, former Dayton City Commissioner R. Mark Henry, both say that settlement negotiations are underway, Eli Rosenbaum, the director of the Justice Department’s Office of Special Investigations, which is prosecuting the case, isn’t making any public pronouncements.

“I haven’t denied (or confirmed) anything,” Rosenbaum said.

Although reluctant to reveal details, Henry said, “Both sides agreed to ask the court to take the matter off the trial calendar,” so settlement could be discussed.

The case had been continued from March until Sept. 13, but Rice removed it from his trial docket in early September based on the attorneys’ request.

The Bucmys case is the first deportation matter over which Rice has presided in his 24 years on the federal bench.

Rice said he intends to limit the amount of time the parties have to negotiate a settlement, although he declined to offer specifics.

“It depends on the type of case and how realistic settlement is,” he said.
Despite his unwillingness to allow an open-ended negotiation period, Rice said, “settlements with the government take longer because the settlement has to be approved by several levels of command.

“At issue is whether Bucmys’s citizenship will be revoked and I assume settlement discussions revolve around that.”

Rice has not been privy to the exact nature of the negotiations since he is not involved in them, he said.

While both the Office of Special Investigations and Henry informed Rice there were no new developments in the negotiations as of Sept. 20, Henry did say, “I hope we will file a settlement entry within a couple of weeks.”