“Rufolo Rossini, your deputy. He didn’t tell me to do this, but from what he said, I assumed that you would want us to act, since it made sense.”
“You assumed? Has Air Traffic Control now taken on foreign and domestic policy decisions as well?”
“No, Minister, I…”
“Release that flight at once. Get him out of Italian airspace as fast as you can. Rossini had no authority to give you that order.”
“But, Minister, Italy was trying to arrest the occupant of that aircraft, no?”
“Since you’re intent on making national policy, let me tell you what the President, and I, want. We want that EuroAir flight and the former American President on it out of Italy as fast as possible! The last thing in the world Italy needs is a worldwide media circus focusing on whether we’re doing the right thing with respect to President Harris. If we hold him, we lose. If we extradite him, we lose. If we try him, we lose. But if he flies away on his own to escape the warrant, we at least come out diplomatically intact. Where does he want to go?”
“London.”
“Wonderful. Let the English battle this one. Get him out of here!”
“I’m very sorry, sir. If you’ll let me go, now, we’ll release the clearance.”
“See to it! And don’t you ever dare make an assumption like that on your own again.”
The man rang off and Anselmo slammed the receiver back into place with enough force to startle his secretary, who peered around the corner of the office to make sure he was all right.
“Sir?”
“Find Rossini and get him in here immediately! I must find out who else he’s been manipulating behind my back.”
Nigel White had briefed both Geoffrey Wallace and Jay Reinhart about the probable futility of any attempt to quash the Interpol warrant in the setting of a magistrate court.
“Basically, all we can do is listen and grumble a bit, unless you’ve got evidence that the warrant is truly bogus,” White advised.
Sir William Stuart Campbell’s presentation of the Peruvian warrant was predictable, but the image of Nigel White suddenly rising to his feet was not.
“Judge, may it please the court,” Nigel said, watching carefully as the magistrate peered over the half-glasses he was wearing.
“Mr. White? What say you in this matter?”
Stuart Campbell turned in slight surprise.
“On behalf of Mr. John Harris, former President of the United States of America, I pray the court consent to hear important evidence that the offered warrant, while authentic in its issuance by Peru, states its cause fraudulently, not only under British law, but under Peruvian law as well.”
The magistrate frowned and leaned forward. “Mr. White, in the court’s view, this is not the forum for contesting the validity of those charges. In addition, I might add that you yourself just testified to the validity of the warrant’s origin, which is all I’m concerned with at the moment.”
“What better forum exists, sir? Should we wait for the injustice of an actual arrest of a former head of state of the most powerful nation on earth before discovering that this warrant is essentially a lie, alleging a crime that in no way could have been committed by Mr. Harris? This does not constitute the application of justice.”
“Perhaps not, Mr. White, but it constitutes the application of the laws of Great Britain in the matter of arrest and extradition, in the order in which they are to be applied. Now sit down please.”
“No, sir, I will not sit. I stand to beg you to permit Mr. Harris’s American attorney, Mr. Jayson Reinhart, to speak to this matter.”
The magistrate shook his head in mild disgust and pointed his gavel at Stuart Campbell, who had been standing at his respective table with a bemused expression.
“Mr. White, unless you can convince Sir William Campbell here to permit such a useless debate, and one which in no way will affect my ruling, I require you to SIT DOWN, sir!”
Stuart Campbell turned to the judge and raised a finger. “Sir, if you please.”
“Sir William? Surely you’re not prepared to say such argument is acceptable to your client?”
“On the contrary. However, the government of Peru also has no wish to engage in even the appearance of intransigence when it comes to presenting a full and complete evidentiary record. Regardless of the legal immateriality of it, I would be pleased to listen to Mr. Reinhart of America, if this court would consent to hear him.”
The magistrate sat back as if struck. “Indeed. And just when I was prepared to expect you gentlemen to adhere to those boring procedures prescribed by law. But why should we stand on legality, eh? What do we think this is, a court? Very well, Sir William, I shall grant Mr. Reinhart an audience of five minutes, and that is that. Mr. Reinhart?”
Jay got to his feet feeling entirely off-balance and unprepared. “Yes, your honor… ah, I mean, Your Lordship.”
“I’m not addressed as ‘Your Lordship,’ Mr. Reinhart, and you needn’t be concerned with the courtesies of our court,” the magistrate said, leaning forward and gesturing with his gavel, “since you are not a member of this bar and are not required to follow them. Not a whit of what you have to say will legally amount to a tinker’s damn anyway, but as a courtesy to your client, and to yourself, you may address the court for five minutes.”
“Thank you, sir,” Jay said.
The judge sat back with an expression of mild amazement, his right hand cupping his face.
“May it please this court,” Jay began, “I appreciate the opportunity to speak to this matter. I shall be very brief. And I should tell you that I am very experienced in international practice and fully understand the mandates of the Treaty Against Torture under which this Interpol warrant is presented. We are not arguing that President Harris is protected by the Doctrine of Sovereign Immunity. That doctrine does not apply to such crimes as charged, as was properly established in the Pinochet case. What this court should consider, however, is that the charges in this warrant are patently false and do not state a sufficient criminal allegation to be afforded the full faith and credit of a British warrant. Peru alleges that President Harris personally ordered the para-military raid against a suspected Peruvian illegal drug factory that led to the admitted torture and murder of eighty-four men, women, and children. It was a horrible act, to be sure. Yet Peru has failed utterly to offer any proof whatsoever in this forum, or any other, that connects the order to commence this raid with any knowledge President Harris could possibly have possessed that torture and murder were to be used by the hired mercenaries who carried out this action. President Harris issued a blanket order to the Central Intelligence Agency… called a ‘finding’ under American procedure… that called for the CIA to search out and destroy the drug-making capability of the subject factory. That order is a matter of record in American archives. There is virtually nothing in that order, or anything else that Peru has presented, which indicates that President Harris knew, or could have known, that the CIA agent in charge in Peru was going to hire a gang of cutthroats and instruct them to do what they did. Sir, in the utter absence of any evidence to support this warrant, and under the common law and the rules of criminal procedure of Great Britain, Peru has a required burden to present a case that has some connection with the crime, and they have failed that burden. In the absence of such threshold offering of proof, this court should deny the warrant.”
“Is that your statement, Mr. Reinhart?” the magistrate said, still sitting back, his chin on his hand.
“Yes, sir,” Jay said, feeling completely ineffective.
“Thank you.” The magistrate sat up. “Now, if you gentlemen don’t mind terribly, I will proceed to issue my ruling and get on to the press of daily chores before this court.”