Boļeslavs Maikovskis

Boļeslavs Maikovskis (21 January 1904 – 19 April 1996) was a Latvian Nazi collaborator who served as chief of police for the second precinct of Rēzekne while the Germans occupied Latvia in World War II. After the war Maikovskis went to Austria before reaching the United States in 1951.[1]

Maikovskis lied on his US visa application when asked whether he had "been complicit in the persecutions of others during World War II". That question was removed from the application the year after Maikovskis emigrated to the United States. Maikovskis lived in Mineola, New York, for 36 years, where he was active in Latvian organizations, and worked as a carpenter until his retirement.[1] He also served on a subcommittee of the Committee to Re-elect the President during Richard M. Nixon's 1972 campaign.[1]

In 1965, Maikovskis was wanted for trial, and was tried and sentenced to death in absentia, in his former Latvia (by the then Soviet Union).[1] His crimes were detailed in a late 1970s 60 Minutes Sunday show. Maikovskis was previously featured in the book Wanted: The Search for Nazis in America,[2] by Howard Blum (1977 & 1989). The original publisher, Fawcett Books, was a CBS News affiliate.

The Soviet Union, which had no extradition treaty with the United States, demanded his extradition. The United States refused, but the Immigration and Naturalization Service began an investigation whose hearings, court actions and appeals lasted more than 20 years. [1]

Maikovskis fled from the US in 1987 after his deportation to the Soviet Union became a certainty. He settled in West Germany after secretly convincing a diplomatic official to grant him a visa. Maikovskis was tried under the German court system in 1988, but by 1994 was deemed too frail to continue with the trial. He died in Münster in 1996, aged 92, from a heart attack.[1]