It’s been thirty years since a bomb strapped to an abandoned motorcycle exploded outside a Paris synagogue with so much force a flaming car flew a storey into the air.
It’s been two years since an Ottawa sociology professor was accused of being a Palestinian terrorist responsible for killing four bystanders and wounding 40 others.
Finally, Hassan Diab’s twice-delayed extradition hearing is scheduled to begin - if his lawyers fail in a bid they’ll launch Monday to persuade a judge to toss it out.
Canadian prosecutors seeking his extradition on behalf of France say there’s a circumstantial but strong case against him.
The French allege that Diab - part of a five-man “hit team” - built the bomb with plastic explosives and placed it on the motorcyle, where it would have detonated as more than 300 worshippers left the Rue Copernic synagogue had the service not run long.
But the Lebanese-born dual citizen, 56, and his supporters say he’s the victim of mistaken identity and French officials have misrepresented and manipulated the evidence, much of it unverified and unverifiable secret intelligence.
“He’s innocent, he’s absolutely innocent and he’s trying to shadow box against secret intelligence,” lawyer Donald Bayne said. “The French don’t even know where it came from.”
Bayne is seeking a stay arguing France’s actions are an abuse of process that violates Diab’s Charter rights and “strikes at the very heart” of an extradition process the Supreme Court demands be “scrupulously fair.”
He alleges at least a dozen examples.
France, Bayne charges, first alleged intelligence showed Diab entered and left France with his own passport then - when his passport put him in Spain at the time - that he used fake documents to enter France.
Investigators link Diab to a 1981 Antwerp, Beligum, bombing but don’t say, the defence charges, that the motive and means were totally different and other terror groups claimed responsibility. Nor did they admit prints left on the car where the explosives were stored and on a statement made by the alleged bomber don’t match Diab, Bayne contends.
Prosecutors acting for France have argued that under Canadian extradition law, our treaty partner’s evidence is presumed accurate unless it’s “manifestly unreliable.”
Unlike at a Canadian criminal trial, that evidence is documents - the French record of the case and what evidence Diab won the right to call - not live witnesses.
“The documents are the case,” said prosecutor Claude LeFrancois, who summed up the test for extradition.
“Whether there’s evidence upon which a reasonable jury, properly instructed, could reach a verdict of guilty - if the answer is yes, there will be committal,” he said.
Thirty years on, a decision is unlikely to be speedy.
The extradition hearing is scheduled to wrap up Dec. 3 but Judge Robert Maranger, who’s already presided over 18 months of often-acrimonious arguments, said last week he has the rest of the year.
“We have the luxury of time to bring this matter to a conclusion, one way or another,” he said.
