A former Strait-area man facing 43 charges for allegedly molesting boys in the 1970s was correctly extradited from India last June, a Nova Scotia Supreme Court judge has ruled.
That means Ernest Fenwick MacIntosh can expect his preliminary hearing to go ahead Oct. 7 on all of those charges unless his lawyer appeals Justice Frank Edwards’s decision.
Mr. MacIntosh is charged with multiple counts of gross indecency and indecent assault involving nine Nova Scotia boys in the 1970s. He was released on $60,000 bail in April and is living in Halifax Regional Municipality. Mr. MacIntosh’s lawyer tried last month to get most of the charges against his client dropped.
Brian Casey argued that the Indian court extradited the 64-year-old without sufficient evidence to support most of the charges, which meant Mr. MacIntosh might be facing charges other than those for which he had been extradited.
But Justice Edwards said Mr. Casey had misinterpreted a portion of the extradition treaty.
Any concerns about the evidence that the Indian court used to decide whether to extradite Mr. MacIntosh should have been brought up at that time, Justice Edwards said in his decision.
"It is not my role to determine what evidence India would require."
According to extradition laws, an accused cannot be prosecuted for any offences he was not brought back to face unless he consented to his extradition.
A July 2006 certificate of authentication asks that Mr. Mac-Intosh be extradited on all 43 counts. The request for extradition from July 2005 also asks that the accused be returned to Canada to face all of those charges.
"Extradition was requested for 43 charges and extradition was granted," Justice Edwards said in the decision. "Moreover, as I have already noted, MacIntosh consented to the extradition."
Mr. MacIntosh co-operated with authorities so he could have "time to wind up his affairs in India prior to his surrender."
The Port Hawkesbury Crown attorney working on the case said he agrees with the judge’s decision.
"We think it was an appropriate decision, and now that (the judge) has made the decision, we are ready to proceed to the preliminary inquiry," Richard MacKinnon said.
For one of Mr. MacIntosh’s alleged victims, this is a tentative step forward in a process that has already taken more than 10 years.
The RCMP laid charges against Mr. MacIntosh in 1995. The former hockey executive for the junior B Strait Pirates had moved to India a year earlier.
He was not brought back to Canada until last spring.
"(You) expect our (legal) system to deal with things in a reasonably timely fashion, but it’s such a long, drawn-out process that it’s really difficult for the victims," said one of the complainants, who is now in his 40s. "So when I say I’m cautiously optimistic, (it’s because) we’ve made some major gains in this process. But we’ve had some major setbacks."
The man said that learning the case will go to the preliminary hearing stage has helped him regain some confidence in the legal system. His faith was shaken in April after Mr. MacIntosh was granted bail.
The complainant said he decided to talk about the alleged abuse to prevent it from happening to others and to increase awareness of the problem.
