NEW YORK, NY: The amicus curise brief filed by the US branch of the International human rights organization Amnesty International was accepted for filing by Judge Robert W Sweet in the US District court of the southern District of New York in Manhattan here on December 6 after a conference attended by the consuls for the respondents as well as the government attorneys. An oral hearing will be held on January 12. The 28 page brief, which is in tum supported by an appendix consisting of 15 separate documents, was filed on November 27.
The attorneys for the respondents as well as Sikh leaders have maintained that Ranjit Singh and Sukhminder Singh will face torture and possible death in a fake encounter staged by the police if they were to be deported to India.
The Amnesty International brief concludes that “based on its information, Amnesty International respectfully summits that Sikhs, particularly those suspected of advocating the transformation of the present state of Punjab to a separate and independent state of Khalistan face a definite risk of being tortured, of becoming victims in extrajudicial killings in staged “encounters”. In addition persons charged with politically motivated offenses carrying the death penalty, risk convictions and executions based on insufficient evidence. It is Al’s understanding that petitioners Mr. Gill and Mr. Sandhu are Sikhs and members for the All India Sikh Students Federation, a group which advocates an independent Sikh state, and as such would if extradited to India, task being sentenced to death following a unfair trial, killed in a false “encounter” staged by the police, or tortured.
Talking to WSN Ronald Kuby an associated of the famous civil rights attorney William Kunstler who along with Ms. Mary B. Pike, had appeared for the respondents said, “We are confident that once the evidence that we have collected is considered and reviewed by the court, any fair minded person would conclude that it would be a violation of due process to send Sukhminder and Ranjit back to India.”
The respondents were arrested by the FBI in New Jersey on a warrant by the Indian government which alleged their involvement in conspiracy to murder of General Vaidya who had alleged the Indian Army’s assault on the Golden Temple in which thousands of innocent pilgrims died.
The case took a bizarre tum when Judy Russell who was the Special Assistant United States Attorney who represented the Government of India in the extradition case was discovered by the Federal Bureau of Investigation to have been sending threatening letters, made to appear to be from sympathizers of the Sikhs, to the magistrate presiding over the case as well as herself. The first letter was sent on January 14, 1988 and such letters continued until March 3, 1989.
The letters caused authorities to take stringent security measures which included shackling of the two respondents, Sukhminder Singh and Ranjit Singh Gill, throughout the course of the proceedings posting guards on rooftops and providing around the clock security to Ms. Russell.
Judy Russell had visited India in connection with the case and had continued to handle the case in spite of her opening a law firm with other former prosecutors and leaving the government. Her plea of “not guilty by reasons of insanity” to one count of corrupt endeavor to influence obstruct and impede due administration of the United States District Court was accepted and she was given a very light sentence by the court. She ‘was not required to serve any sentence in jail. She was only asked to undergo psychiatric treatment. She is free to practice law. Ronald Kuby had than said, “It is a tainted and corrupt conclusion to a completely tainted and corrupt extradition proceeding.”
Article extracted from this publication >> December 15, 1989
