[IPSM] Alleged Alaskan pipeline bomb plotter extradicted to US from Canada

[Macdonald Stainsby]

By ROBERT MATAS

Friday, August 5, 2005 Page S1
Globe and mail

VANCOUVER -- A Canadian accused of planning to blow up the Alaska pipeline
on New Year's Day, 2000, has lost a bid to quash a request from the U.S.
government for his extradition.

The British Columbia Court of Appeal, in a 2-1 decision this week,
rejected an application for a judicial review of a ministerial order to
send Alfred Reumayr to the United States to face charges related to
possession of explosives and attempted arson.

The court dismissed concerns similar to those raised by commentators this
week in the extradition case of Vancouver marijuana advocate Marc Emery.
Some observers have suggested that Mr. Emery, accused of selling marijuana
seeds in the United States, would be treated more harshly under U.S. law
than in a Canadian jurisdiction.

Mr. Reumayr said that if convicted, he would be subjected to cruel and
unusual punishment, and would likely die in a U.S. prison before becoming
eligible for release. If he were convicted on all charges and there were
no sentence reductions for mitigating circumstances, he could receive
terms of 20 to 30 years, running concurrently.

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The court decided that a gross discrepancy in sentencing between Canada
and the United States for similar conduct would not be grounds for
quashing an extradition request.

Madam Justice Catherine Anne Ryan, who wrote the majority opinion, stated
she was not persuaded the punishment would be "so severe as to
sufficiently shock the Canadian conscience."

The court also ruled there is no requirement that the law under which
charges are laid be identical in the two countries. The Extradition Act
requires only that the alleged conduct would have constituted an offence
punishable in Canada.

"These words make it clear that, as long as the conduct supports a
Canadian offence, it does not matter what the offence might be or how the
constituent elements are described in Canada. The person is liable to
extradition," Judge Ryan wrote.

Mr. Reumayr, who has been in jail since he was arrested on a warrant on
Aug. 17, 1999, also lost his bid to be released from jail because the case
has dragged on too long. Judge Ryan found the government's delay in
handling the extradition case to be "troubling," but not unreasonable in
the complex circumstances of the case.

Mr. Reumayr, who is from New Westminster, is accused of attempting to bomb
the pipeline by sending letters and e-mails to New Mexico resident Albert
Paxton. Mr. Reumayr, 56, met Mr. Paxton in the 1980s while serving a
prison sentence for mail fraud. Mr. Paxton became a confidential informant
for the authorities.

The prosecution's case against Mr. Reumayr includes letters, e-mail
correspondence and a record of two meetings held in Canada that were under
surveillance by the RCMP.

Prosecutors also allege that Mr. Reumayr gave bomb components to Mr.
Paxton. The components included 185 grams of the chemical PETN
(pentaerythritol tetranitrate, one of the strongest high explosives),
which was used in the bombing of a federal building in Oklahoma City that
killed 168 people in 1995, U.S. prosecutors say in documents submitted to
a New Mexico court.

A court heard during the extradition proceedings in British Columbia that
Mr. Reumayr told Mr. Paxton on July 22, 1999, about a plan to detonate 14
homemade bombs at three points along the pipeline.

If successful, the scheme could have caused oil shortages within two weeks
in California and other western states. The flow of oil through the
pipeline could have been interrupted for up to 90 days, and oil and gas
prices would have risen.

U.S. prosecutors said Mr. Reumayr planned to buy oil futures and invest in
gas and electric securities. Mr. Reumayr had talked of making $20-million
on a $10,000 investment, prosecutors said.

Mr. Reumayr's former lawyer, John Banks, said his client may have talked
about plans, but he never intended to carry them out. Mr. Reumayr said he
was entrapped by U.S. authorities working with an informant. His wife,
Linda Reumayr, said he did not mean to hurt anyone. "It was mainly a money
thing," she said.

Meanwhile, a complication developed in the case in late June, when Mr.
Paxton was diagnosed as having non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. Prosecutors applied
in July to have his testimony at the extradition proceedings in Canada
accepted in a U.S. court if Mr. Reumayr is extradited. It was too early to
know Mr. Paxton's prognosis or when he might be well enough to testify,
the New Mexico court was told.

Mr. Reumayr has been in custody since his arrest and was not available for
comment yesterday. His current lawyer, Mark Jette, and federal government
lawyer Deborah Strachan, who represented the United States in the Canadian
court, were also unavailable.



--
Macdonald Stainsby
http://independentmedia.ca/survivingcanada/
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green
In the contradiction lies the hope.
--Brecht.