"Former Ottawa academic Hassan Diab is back in a Paris jail barely a week after he was released on bail. French prosecutors had filed an appeal on Saturday, after
terrorist suspect Diab was released on May 17, alleging he was a flight
risk and a threat to civil order. His defence team had hoped that
the appeal judges would accept Diab’s presence at Tuesday afternoon’s
appeal hearing, and the lack of public interest in his release, would be
a successful counter to the prosecution grounds for keeping the
62-year-old Canadian citizen in jail. Diab’s Canadian lawyer Don Bayne called the decision “tragic. “It’s
an extension of an ongoing tragic miscarriage of justice and a wrongful
conviction in the making,” Bayne said. “He shouldn’t have been
extradited by Canada, and look at what’s happened to him and his family.
Eighteen months in custody, then out, then in custody, and still no
trial and no mention of a trial.” Diab’s wife Rania Tfaily said she was “crushed” by the decision. “Hassan fully abided by his bail conditions for several
years in Canada,” she said. “In fact, a journalist informed Hassan that
he was under investigation more than a year before France submitted a
request for his extradition. Hassan could have legally travelled
anywhere during that period.” Diab’s Paris lawyer, William Bourdon, said the defence would appeal Tuesday’s decision to the French Supreme Court Diab is accused of murder and attempted murder for his alleged involvement in an October 1980 Paris terrorist bomb attack. The blast, allegedly carried out by an arm of the Popular
Front for the Liberation of Palestine, killed four passersby and injured
more than 40 inside and outside the synagogue. The former Carleton and University of Ottawa sociology
lecturer denies any involvement, denies he was in Paris at the time and
says he is an innocent victim of mistaken identity. A legal roller coaster has surrounded Diab’s release, with
the investigating magistrate overseeing the case ruling that the
academic is neither a flight risk nor a threat to French public order... French authorities have so far presented little concrete
evidence against Diab other than unsourced intelligence reports that
Canadian federal prosecutors representing France were forced to withdraw
because they couldn’t prove they were not gleaned from torture. That leaves French handwriting analysis comparing Diab’s
handwriting with words on a hotel register written by one of the alleged
perpetrators. Three internationally renowned experts called by Bayne to
testify at the extradition hearing unanimously dismissed the analysis as
incompetent. Maranger (Judge who made the extradition order HL) characterized the handwriting analysis as
“convoluted, very confusing with conclusions that are suspect” and
doubted it would be enough to convict in a Canadian criminal court. Despite those reservations, he said Canadian extradition law left him no choice. Both the handwriting evidence and the intelligence reports
will apparently be part of the prosecution case when, and if, the case
goes to trial."
Is The Age of Progressive Prosecutors Over?
22 hours ago
