VANCOUVER, August 10, 2004
By ROBERT MATAS
Globe and Mail
A key prosecution witness at the Air-India trial offered to change
his testimony if the defence coached him on what to say, the court heard
yesterday. The witness also offered to disappear before testifying if
the defence paid him, the international terrorism trial was told.
The prosecution witness has provided some of the most important evidence
in the case against defendant Ajaib Singh Bagri. He testified earlier
this year that Mr. Bagri told him he was part of the Air-India conspiracy
responsible for killing 331 people in 1985.
The RCMP paid him $300,000 (U.S.) after he agreed to testify, but a
court order prohibits the media from publishing any information that
could identify the witness.
The defence suggested yesterday the witness made statements during
conversations with Kamal Jit that raised doubts about the reliability
of his court testimony. Mr. Jit and the witness are long-time acquaintance
from India who renewed their relationship after both immigrated to the
United States.
The witness told Mr. Jit, a 48-year-old New York cab driver, that he
was repeatedly asked about the Air-India disaster when he was a leader
of a Sikh separatist group in 1985, Mr. Jit recalled. He asked Mr. Bagri
about who was responsible for the bomb blasts. Mr. Bagri suggested he
deflect the persistent questioning by shifting the blame.
"If people ask you, you say, 'We did it.' You tell them, 'Why
[are] you bothering me?' If people [keep] asking you, you say, 'We did
it.' " Mr. Jit recalled the witness quoting Mr. Bagri as saying.
The prosecution has told the court that Mr. Bagri's comments were in
effect an admission of his involvement in the Air-India plot.
The defence, however, suggested the prosecution was reading too much
into the comments.
Mr. Jit said the witness told him in a conversation in October of 2003
that he did not anticipate his statements about Mr. Bagri would be so
important in the trial.
He told Mr. Jit that he was under stress, "in fear" of the
U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation, when he initially spoke to the
authorities. He did not elaborate on why he was afraid of the FBI, Mr.
Jit said.
But once he made his statement to the authorities, he could not change
what he said.
"It was a small thing. I did not know it [would be] blown up so
much," Mr. Jit recalled the witness saying. "Now I cannot
go back."
He could, however, "run away from this place" before testifying
at the Air-India trial if the Bagri family gave him some money, Mr.
Jit recalled the witness saying.
Or he could change his testimony, Mr. Jit said.
The witness asked Mr. Jit to convey a message to Mr. Bagri's lawyers.
Ask the lawyers how he should testify so that Mr. Bagri "could
be saved," Mr. Jit recounted the witness saying.
The witness believed that Mr. Bagri was innocent, Mr. Jit also said.
Mr. Jit's testimony marked the resumption of the trial after a two-week
summer break. After 30 minutes of testimony, however, the court adjourned
until tomorrow to allow the prosecution to prepare its cross-examination.
Prosecutor Richard Cairns told the court he needed time to allow the
FBI to look into Mr. Jit's testimony. Defence lawyer Richard Peck objected
to the delay.
Mr. Cairns knew about Mr. Jit for months, Mr. Peck said. Mr. Jit told
the court that Mr. Cairns, accompanied by an FBI officer and an RCMP
officer, went to New York in May to speak to him.
Mr. Peck said Mr. Cairns also went to India earlier this year while
working on his response to Mr. Jit's evidence. Mr. Peck questioned some
people about the kidnapping of Mr. Jit's son in the early 1990s, he
said.
The multimillion-dollar trial began on April 28, 2003. Mr. Bagri and
Ripudaman Singh Malik are charged with murder in the deaths of 329 people
killed on June 23, 1985, in a bomb explosion aboard an Air-India flight
from Canada, and the deaths in a bomb blast of two baggage handlers
at Tokyo's airport killed 54 minutes earlier.
The prosecution alleges the bombs were put on airplanes in Vancouver
by a group of Canadian-based Sikh terrorists seeking revenge against
the Indian government.