OSIJEK, Croatia (AP) — An Associated Press investigation finds that dozens of suspected Nazi war criminals and SS guards have collected millions of dollars in Social Security payments after being forced out of the United States.

The payments flowed through a legal loophole that has given the U.S. Justice Department leverage to persuade Nazi suspects to leave. Interviews and internal government records show that if those suspects agreed to go, or simply fled before deportation, they could keep their Social Security.

Many suspected Nazi war criminals and SS guards lied about their Nazi pasts to get into the U.S. following World War II, and eventually became American citizens.

One of them is former Auschwitz guard Jakob Denzinger. In 1989, as the U.S. government prepared to strip him of his citizenship, Denzinger fled to Germany and later settled in Croatia, where he lives comfortably, courtesy of U.S. taxpayers.

He collects a Social Security payment of about $1,500 each month, nearly twice the take-home pay of an average Croatian worker.