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Tag: extradition
Seven Colombian Taxi Drivers Extradited To U.S. In DEA Agent’s Death

Seven Colombian Taxi Drivers Extradited To U.S. In DEA Agent’s Death

By Chris Kraul, Los Angeles Times

BOGOTA, Colombia — Seven Colombian taxi drivers charged with murder in the death of an off-duty U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent were extradited Tuesday to stand trial in Virginia, capping a case that highlighted the pervasive dangers of kidnappings in this Andean capital as well as the omnipresence of video surveillance cameras.

The case also brought to the fore the use of a rarely used legal strategy by which the U.S. government successfully argued for the seven suspects’ extradition. Human rights organizations have been critical of the tactic.

James Terry Watson, 40, was killed late on June 20, 2013, after entering a taxi in a popular restaurant and club zone in north Bogota. Using a common criminal scheme, two men in a following taxi jumped in when Watson’s taxi stopped at a traffic signal, allegedly intending to rob him. Watson resisted and was stabbed to death, authorities said.

The crime is commonly referred to as “express kidnapping” because the conspiring criminals typically take the victim to a bank ATM machine and order him or her to drain their accounts of cash before being released.

The suspects were arrested and charged within days of the crime after a massive deployment of Colombian police investigators, with assists from the DEA and other U.S. law enforcement officials.
The suspects were identified as Wilson Peralta, Edgar Murillo, Hector Lopez, Edwin Figueroa, Omar Valdes, Julio Ramirez, and Andres Oviedo. They will stand trial for murder in U.S. District for the Eastern District of Virginia.

Important leads in the case were provided from evidence recorded by 40 video surveillance cameras placed at apartment buildings and businesses. The cameras captured Watson fleeing the taxi after being stabbed, as well as the taxi terminal where the suspects were shown the next day washing blood stains from seat cushions.

Like other U.S. embassy employees in Bogota, Watson, a 13-year veteran of the DEA, was warned never to take taxis off the street but to call for them to reduce the risk of such robberies.

Colombian police Gen. Ricardo Restrepo said at a news conference Tuesday morning that the seven men were among 94 Colombians extradited so far this year to stand trial in foreign countries. Of those, 82 were accused of drug trafficking and 10 were arrested on murder charges.

U.S. officials claimed the suspects were eligible for extradition because Watson was living and working in Colombia with diplomatic status and that the Vienna convention of rules and procedures covering diplomats enabled the transfer.

But Colombian human rights advocates fought the extradition order signed by President Juan Manuel Santos, saying U.S. courts had no jurisdiction over the case and that the removal to Virginia put an unfair burden on the suspects’ families.

Colombian officials, however, did not disguise their eagerness to see the suspects flown to face U.S. justice because of the message it sent. A special police unit dedicated to kidnappings said it subsequently has broken up eight other bands that operated in the area where Watson was killed, Semana magazine reported.

As a result, express kidnappings in Bogota have declined by 60 percent since the Watson case, according to one government official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak.

Watson, an Army veteran, was a U.S. marshal and deputy sheriff in Richland Parish, La., before joining the Drug Enforcement Agency.

AFP Photo / Mandel Ngan

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Turkey PM Seeks Cleric’s Extradition From U.S.

Turkey PM Seeks Cleric’s Extradition From U.S.

Ankara (AFP) – Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Tuesday he will seek the extradition of an exiled cleric he accuses of orchestrating a major corruption scandal against his government from his base in the United States.

Erdogan told reporters that a legal procedure “will begin” for the extradition of Fethullah Gulen, a former ally he says is running a “parallel state” that reaches into the top echelons of the Turkish police and judiciary.

The prime minister’s comments came a day after he told U.S. broadcaster PBS that he wants President Barack Obama to deport Gulen and send him back to Turkey.

Erdogan said he hoped Washington would deliver on the issue as a “model partner.”

“At least they should deport him,” he said.

But a legal expert at Ankara’s Bilkent University said Erdogan’s plan was a “non-starter.”

“A crime that requires extradition must be recognized in both countries. In this case, there’s no such thing,” Yuksel Inan, a professor of international law, told AFP.

“It is a non-starter in terms of international law. Erdogan is just showing off,” he said.

Turkey and the United States signed an extradition treaty in 1979. The U.S. embassy in Ankara said it could neither confirm nor deny whether an extradition request had been made.

“As a matter of long-standing policy, the Department of State does not comment on pending extradition requests,” an embassy official told AFP.

Gulen, 73, was once a close ally of the prime minister, helping him to challenge the military’s traditional stranglehold on Turkish politics and install his Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP) in power in 2002.

Followers of Gulen’s Hizmet movement are said to number in the millions and own a variety of businesses, media outlets, cultural centers and a network of schools both in Turkey and abroad.

The moderate cleric was forced to flee the country in 1999 after he was accused of plotting against the secular government of the time.

But his alliance with the AKP has faltered in recent years, and was decisively shattered in December when police detained dozens of Erdogan’s key business and political allies over bribery allegations.

Erdogan has repeatedly accused Gulen’s followers of engineering the corruption scandal as well as a string of damaging leaks in the media. The prime minister retaliated by sacking thousands of police and prosecutors.

Gulen has denied any involvement in the corruption probe.

After the AKP scored a crushing victory in last month’s local polls, an emboldened Erdogan hinted he would take steps against Gulen’s movement.

“We will enter their caves and… they will pay the price,” he warned in a victory speech from the balcony of the party’s Ankara headquarters last month.

“There won’t be a state within a state,” he said.

The AKP has already pushed through a law to close private preparatory schools, a key part of Gulen’s network.

In the PBS interview, Erdogan said his only contact with Gulen since becoming prime minister had been a few phone conversations, and that they had initially maintained “good relations.”

“The real problem began after 2011,” he said. That was when Erdogan’s government accused Gulen followers of leaking information from secret talks between the Turkish spy agency and Kurdish rebels.

Erdogan told PBS that the police raids in December were “almost a coup, a civilian coup” by the Gulen movement.

“We were aware they were trying to infiltrate various organisations, but we were not aware of their ultimate bad intentions. We realised this after a while and started to take measures,” he said.

Gulen said in a comment piece published in the Financial Times last month that a new democratic constitution, drafted by civilians, was needed to restore trust at home and abroad.

Having exhausted his party’s limit of three terms as premier, 60-year-old Erdogan is thought to be planning a run for the presidency in August, the first time voters will directly elect the head of state.

Adem Altan AFP