PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, Sept 16, CMC – Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi says he will not publicly deal with the extradition of former FIFA vice president Austin Jack Warner in public as the deadline for signing off on the extradition request by the United States expired on Wednesday.
Al-Rawi, who was sworn into office last Wednesday, said that due process would apply even as his office would observe the time markers involved in the matter.
“The AG’s office has to be marked with some degree of discipline. I’m in the course of dealing with a number of matters, one of which is the extradition matter of course. But I will be speaking within my Constitutional remit. I don’t propose to litigate the matter in public. So I think we must have a little bit of measure in that particular matter,” he told reporters.
Warner, 72, who is scheduled to re-appear before Chief Magistrate on September 21, has been released on TT$2.5 million (One TT dollar =US$0.16) bail when he made his first court appearance on May 27.
He is charged with 12 offences related to racketeering, corruption and money laundering allegedly committed in the jurisdiction of the United States and Trinidad and Tobago, dating as far back as 1990.
US law enforcement authorities earlier this year arrested a number of FIFA officials as part of the probe.
Court officials said that Al-Rawi’s office will most likely seek another extension from the court on the matter, but the Attorney General refused to indicate what would be his new position.
“I don’t propose to speak about that just yet. I need to make sure the matter is properly dealt with first and then the publicity comes after. One ought not to mitigate matters in public that are half baked or in respect of which things are ongoing.”
When he last appeared in court on August 28, Warner questioned the delay by then attorney general Garvin Nicholas in signing the necessary documents to proceed with the matter.
“We have an AG and if he can’t sign it, because of bias, he can delegate someone to sign it. Delegate someone, if because you’re bias and if because you owe me money and if of course you have a lot of pre-trial publicity and you can’t sign it, then give it to somebody to sign.
“The law provides for that. You can delegate it but you see the fact is I want to take them on. I want to take them on before the election but they want to take me on after the election,” Warner told reporters.
Court observers say if the extradition application is eventually refused, Magistrate Ayers-Caesar will have to quash the proceedings against Warner and return his passport which was seized when he was granted bail after being detained on a Provisional Warrant in July.
The United States will be forced to restart the process afresh theys aid.