PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad, Sep 26 2015 – A senior magistrate Friday adjourned to December 2, the start of the extradition hearing in the case in which the former FIFA vice president Austin Jack Warner is wanted in the United States on corruption and mail fraud related charges.
Deputy Chief Magistrate Mark Wellington dismissed attempts by lawyers for Warner, 72, to have the matter thrown out of court denying a request that the former global football official be discharged from the provisional arrest warrant from the United States.
Warner’s attorneys had requested the discharge after the Attorney General Faris al Rawi had delayed the signing of the authority to proceed.
Al Rawi became attorney general following the September 7 general elections and had requested Chief Magistrate Marcia Ayres-Caesar to vary her order that the authority to proceed be extended so as to allow him more time to review the extradition documents.
Earlier this week, Magistrate Wellington had said he was a bit troubled by the differing arguments and requested time to review the document after Queens Counsel James Lewis, who is representing the state, confirmed that the Al Rawi had signed the authority to proceed on the extradition case.
Warner’s lawyers argued then that, despite signing the authority to proceed, the state missed the original deadline. They had vowed to challenge the matter and predicted a lengthy process.
Warner is wanted in the United States on 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.
