[1] A 31 March 1938 decision made by the Polish government to terminate the citizenship of Poles who had lived abroad for more than 5 years left many Jews of Poland stateless.
[4][5] Questions remained about the legitimacy of the villa as extraterritorial grounds since the Polish government had not purchased it outright.
[4] Chiczewski and his staff supported Jews who arrived at his gates by providing food and shelter, albeit in a limited manner.
[2] Since the villa lacked the means to support large numbers of people, significant assistance was provided by the local community, including families like the Wahrmans.
[4][2] According to Chiczewski's report, he received assurance from the Police Chief of Leipzig that the Jews would not have any trouble remaining in Germany until the matter had been resolved with a Polish-German agreement.
[2] Police reports indicated that Chiczewski encouraged others to burn their passports in order to prevent formal identification of their citizenship used in displacement and the passage over the border into Poland.
[5] For the remaining Jews who had either not been warned, arrested before they could flee, or chose not to seek shelter, Chiczewski attempted to prevent their expulsion at each stage of the process.
Chiczewski was not alone in his belief that the expulsions could be prevented, thus he and other Polish diplomats assured the Jews that their detainment had been a "mistake.