An Ottawa academic accused of bombing a synagogue in Paris 30 years ago will be allowed to present evidence in his own defence as he fights extradition to France.
Canadian Crown prosecutors have presented Justice Robert Maranger with expert evidence from a French handwriting expert who says Diab’s writing matches that on a Paris hotel register where a man the French say was the bomber checked in under an assumed name at the time of the attack, which killed four passersby. They argued that since this is an extradition hearing, not a full trial, Maranger had to accept the French evidence at face value unless it was manifestly unreliable.
But the Lebanese-born Hassan Diab and his lawyer Donald Bayne won a significant legal victory Monday morning when Maranger decided to allow Bayne to introduce the testimony of three more experts who say the French handwriting expert’s analysis is deeply flawed. Maranger ruled that he will hear the defence evidence, but not necessarily that he’ll give it any weight in his final analysis once the case is concluded.
The decision means that the extradition hearing is likely to last at least into January.
