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 News from Around the Americas | March 2008 
Former Prime Minister Intervenes in Brenda Martin Case
 Charles Rusnell - edmontonjournal.com
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| | Brenda Martin | | |
Former prime minister Paul Martin is personally intervening in the case of a Canadian woman who has been imprisoned in Mexico without trial for more than two years and is believed to be suicidal.
Martin met Tuesday with Mexico's vice-minister of foreign affairs to press the case of 51-year-old Brenda Martin.
The former prime minister - who is not related to the woman - is in Mexico City for meetings aimed at expanding the G8 to include a dozen more countries, including Mexico.
"He feels very strongly that she should be released and returned to Canada, and he informed the vice-minister that Canadians feel very strongly about this case," Jim Pimblett, Martin's spokesman, said Tuesday.
The former prime minister is attempting to schedule more meetings with top Mexican officials to press Martin's case, and the Mexicans appear receptive to his diplomatic efforts.
"Mexico has been a big proponent of reforming the G8 because they would be one of the first five allowed in," Pimblett said, but he hastened to add that the woman's case would not affect those efforts.
Martin is also expected to ask the Mexican government to intervene with state prison authorities to stop them from returning Brenda Martin to the general population from hospital, where the Trenton, Ont. native has been on suicide watch for the past four days.
A retired Canadian psychotherapist who visited Martin last week said she is suicidal.
On Monday, a Mexican court ruled against a constitutional challenge by Martin's lawyers who claimed the woman's legal rights had been violated because she was never provided with a proper translator by either the police or the courts.
Her lawyer, Guillermo Cruz Rico of Toronto, said his office in Mexico City received the judge's ruling Tuesday.
It is 800 pages long and will take days to wade through before a decision can be made on an appeal.
Brenda Martin's childhood friend, Deb Tieleman, said it is unconscionable for the Mexicans to return Martin to the general prison population when she is clearly seriously mentally ill.
"That just makes no sense whatsoever, but I guess they figure that since she lost her court case, they can do as they wish with her now," Tieleman said.
In the House of Commons on Tuesday, Liberal consular services critic Dan McTeague again pressed the government to send Mexico a diplomatic note of protest over the violation of Martin's legal and human rights.
Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier was again non-committal, saying only the government was concerned about Martin's case and was pressing the Mexicans to expedite her legal proceedings.
On Monday, Helena Guergis, the secretary of state for consular services, said Canada did not need to issue a diplomatic note because her efforts on Martin's behalf were equivalent to, or stronger than, a diplomatic note.
Martin was employed as a chef for a former Alberta resident, Alyn Richard Waage, in Puerto Vallarta for 10 months in 2001.
Waage was operating an Internet fraud scheme at the time, while pretending to be an investor. He was eventually arrested and is serving a 10-year sentence in a U.S. jail.
Five years after Waage's arrest, Martin was charged with money laundering and being part of a criminal conspiracy.
Although Waage has provided a sworn affidavit stating Martin had no involvement or knowledge of his operations, she has remained in jail since Feb. 17, 2006.
Martin's lawyers have said there is no evidence in the investigative file to support the charges against Martin and they say the breaches of her right to due process are blatant.
crusnell(at)thejournal.canwest.com |
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