NEW YORK: Ranjit Singh Gill and Sukhminder Singh Sandhu saw a foreword move in their long Pending case when a hearing was held Friday, June 26,1992, before U.S. Magistrate Judge, Kathleen A. Roberts of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. The case has been in litigation since May 1987,
Judge Roberts is a new figure in the case. She has replaced the U.S. District Court Judge to whom the case was originally assigned in October 1990, when the Indian government refilled its request for the extradition of Gill and Sandhu.
This was the first time that attorneys Mary Boresz Pike and Ronald L. Kuby and their clients had appeared before the magistrate judge. Much of the hearing was spent with Pike answering Judge Roberis’s queries about Sandhu’s and Gill’s claims to refugee status and about their entitlement to an evidentiary hearing on those claims.
The Government of India was represented by an Assistant United States Attorney from the Southern District of New York and by an attorney from the office of International Affairs of the U.S. Department of Justice. Judge Roberts instructed the Assistant U.S, Attomey to contact the Immigration and Naturalization Service to ascertain what position the INS would take on processing the applications of Gill and Sandhu and on affording them hearings on their claims for asylum and for withholding of deportation.
The Assistant U.S. Attorney is to report back to the magistrate judge by letter, After this happens, the magistrate judge is likely to schedule another hearing.
Attorney Pike said these developments were helpful.
Pike and Kuby hope eventually to get an evidentiary hearing for their clients on the claim that their clients will be persecuted if returned to India,
Sandhu and Gill are also represented by attorney William M. Kunstler.
Article extracted from this publication >> June 10, 1994
