Netflix has published a trailer for its upcoming true crime documentary series, The Devil Next Door.
The five-part series, set for release on Nov. 4, focuses on Israel’s trial of John Demjanjuk, a retired Ukrainian-American auto worker living a comfortable suburban life in Cleveland, Ohio who was reputed to be the Nazi death camp guard known as ‘Ivan the Terrible.’
‘Ivan the Terrible,’ was one of the most infamous guards at the Treblinka extermination camp in Poland, known for his extreme cruelty and violent behavior. He tortured and killed nearly one million Jewish prisoners during World War II.
“The crimes he was accused of were horrid…” a voice-over says in the trailer.
However, the guard’s identity was never definitively established, making Demjanjuk’s trial for his crimes an extremely controversial chapter in the international quest to bring Nazi war criminals to justice.
The series covers the initial accusations by Holocaust survivors, Demjanjuk’s 1986 extradition to Israel and the reactions that followed. It is compiled of news footage from the trial and recent interviews with witnesses, family members and those involved in the case in 1986.
Ted Henry, a well-known anchor on Cleveland’s News 5 channel, wrote on Facebook that footage from his station “plays a major role in this series with the miles of file footage used in the production of the program.”
It is directed and produced by Daniel Sivan and Yossi Bloch, as well as six prominent executive producers that include Ben Braun and Dan Braun, who produced Netflix’s Wild Wild Country. The Devil Next Door comes from the One Man Show and Submarine Deluxe production studios, in association with Yes Studios.
A Jerusalem court convicted Demjanjuk in 1988 and sentenced him to death by hanging. However, in 1993, the Israeli Supreme Court overturned to ruling citing additional evidence.
Later, in 2011, Demjanjuk was convicted in Germany of being an accessory to the murder of 27,900 Jews at the Sobibor concentration camp, but died in the process of appealing the ruling.
“As the case uncovers dark corners of memory and the horrors of war, the Demjanjuk case becomes a race against time for the defendant and his alleged victims,” Netflix wrote.
