so-called "terrorist" Adil Charkaoui freed on bail
February 18, 2005 - 3:59pm
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The Gazette has an article about the case:
quote: No sooner had Adil Charkaoui received news that he was to be freed on bail than his fellow prisoners began laying claim to his belongings.
But the 31-year-old will gladly leave behind a pair of jeans, some books, a radio and CD player to revel today in the sweet embraces of his family and a big plate of couscous - something he hasn't had in almost two years.
"I'm so happy," Charkaoui said in a phone interview from the Rivieres des Prairies detention centre where he's been held without charge since May 2003. "I found out the decision was coming and was waiting minute by minute. Then at 11:30 my lawyer called and said, 'You're free!' "
Charkaoui, who is being held on a security certificate based on secret evidence alleging he's a sleeper agent for Al-Qa'ida, had tried but failed three times to be released on bail. His family had almost given up hope.
But yesterday, 10 days after Charkaoui testified for the first time before Federal Court, Judge Simon Noel agreed to release him. Noel said that with the passage of time, the danger, if there was one, had been neutralized.
"if there was one"????? What if there wasn't? This draconian law would have wasted years of an innocent man's life. [img]frown.gif" border="0[/img]
Oh, and here's the restrictions:
quote: Charkaoui must stay in his north-end apartment between 8:30 p.m. and 8 a.m.; can't use a cell phone, Blackberry, pager, computer or fax and must wear an electronic monitoring bracelet.
The federal government maintains he's still a threat to national security and should be kept behind bars. One of the conditions it wanted was that Charkaoui not be allowed to leave his apartment except for court appearances and medical emergencies.
And if he breaks any condition in any way, he will go back and have no chance at getting out again nor will anyone else on a security thing get out either as they will just point to him
edited to add
Anne mclellan said as much on CBC radio yesterday when asked about it
[ 18 February 2005: Message edited by: Bacchus ]
I don't care what Anne mclellan says. Everybody deserves due process and a fair trial. Dropping to the American standard is not an option.
Does anybody else think that this guy is being held because the Americans say so?
I care what anne mclellan says because it is how you figure out where the gov't is going with this. And their going downwards to the american standard.
If she had said, "well we disagree but the courts have spoken and thats the way we do things here" I'd feel a lot more comfortable
Another secret trial for Adil Charkaoui to begin Oct. 12
quote:Charkaoui, his lawyers and the public won't just be barred from Judge Tremblay-Lamer's courtroom, they'll also be denied access to any of the evidence presented against him, except for secret evidence the judge specifically orders made public.
Charkaoui will be represented by Denis Couture, a special advocate appointed yesterday by Tremblay-Lamer under a law put into place last February.
A second special advocate is to be appointed soon.
Tremblay-Lamer made this and other decisions during a series of sharp exchanges with Johanne Doyon, one of the lawyers who represented Charkaoui in a landmark Supreme Court of Canada case just over a year ago.
In February 2007, the top court declared secret trials to deport non-citizen terror suspects unconstitutional. The court ordered the federal government to rewrite a law it has defended as a key tool in fighting terrorism.
Ottawa added the use of special advocates to the process. The replacement legislation is virtually "a carbon copy of the old law," said Charkaoui, who is also challenging the new law.
"Montrealer, accused of al-Qaeda links, loses bid for Supreme Court review"
http://tinyurl.com/45melf
quote:Adil Charkaoui, a Montreal man accused of links to al-Qaeda, has lost a round in his long-running legal fight to remain in Canada instead of being deported to his native Morocco.
The Supreme Court of Canada said Thursday that it won't hear Charkaoui's constitutional challenge to the system for deciding whether people can be deported to countries where they might be in danger.
The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) contends that Charkaoui, a landed immigrant, is an al-Qaeda sympathizer who should be sent back to his Morocco ...
The judiciary seemingly condones "rendition". In Morocco Charkaoui will be tortured to squeeze information from him, to be shared it with the Canadian security system, the SS.
[ 20 September 2008: Message edited by: mahmud ]
Charkaoui demands apology from Ottawa
On the eve of what he hopes will be his final court hearing, Adil Charkaoui held a “preventative” news conference on Parliament Hill urging the Conservative government to give up the fight against him and apologize.
The Montreal man accused by Ottawa of being an al-Qaeda operative is still celebrating his victory last week in Federal Court, which allowed him to walk out of the hearing a free man and tear off his electronic leg monitor in front of the cameras.
That sudden ruling by Mr. Justice Danièle Tremblay-Lamer in Montreal last Thursday will be made official at a closed-door hearing Wednesday.
Mr. Charkaoui said it is clear to him that the judge's decision effectively ends the government's ability to use the controversial security certificate process used to detain and monitor him, as well as four other men with such cases still before the courts.