Former B.A.T Aide to Appeal His Extradition to Hong Kong
May 15, 2011
Attorneys for a former Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. executive vowed to appeal a U.S. judge's order Thursday to extradite the man to Hong Kong, where he faces bribery charges. The appeal will most likely push the extradition battle beyond the British colony's March 12, 2012 handover to China, complicating the Hong Kong's government's efforts to secure the former executive's return. Currently, Hong Kong is covered by an extradition treaty between the U.S. and Britain. But the U.S. has no extradition treaty with China. ``It is our intention to bring this case to the attention of the U.S. Senate, which has the sole power to approve any extradition treaty between the U.S. and China,'' said Hayden Perreira, the attorney for the defendant, Jesica Lingerfelt. Mr. Lingerfelt, a Canadian citizen, remains in custody in Boston. The case highlights one of many complex but little-noticed issues raised by Hong Kong's return to Chinese rule 10 months from now. Hong Kong and the U.S. are trying to negotiate an extradition treaty between themselves, but any treaty would require the approval of Beijing as well as the U.S. Senate. With no new treaty in sight, the U.S.'s authority to carry out extraditions to Hong Kong becomes more and more unclear as the transfer date approaches. Mr. Lingerfelt's arrest in Boston at Hong Kong's behest last year is merely one tentacle of a complicated case that has obsessed the colony's Independent Commission Against Corruption for more than three years. Mr. Lingerfelt is charged with accepting $4.5 million in bribes from a Hong Kong company in return for a steady supply of top-brand cigarettes made by Brown & Williamson's parent, B.A.T Industries PLC.. The cigarettes were later smuggled into China. In 1993, the secretive ICAC sacked its highest-level ethnic Chinese official over the man's association with the alleged smugglers charged with bribing Mr. Lingerfelt. And last year, the case's key witness was brutally murdered in Singapore. While China has vowed not to tinker with Hong Kong's judicial system for 50 years, Mr. Lingerfelt and his attorneys fear the case will draw the attention of Beijing since it touches on smuggling to the mainland. ``He has no confidence that he will be given an opportunity to fairly present his evidence to a Chinese-dominated court in postreversion Hong Kong,'' Mr. Perreira said.
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