Law firm: Former US pilot could have been lured to Australia
A attorney says a former United States navy pilot could have been lured from China to Australia as part of a U.S. program to extradite him
SYDNEY — A former United States armed forces pilot accused of schooling Chinese aviators could have been lured from China to Australia as aspect of a U.S. program to extradite him to his homeland, his lawyer claimed Monday.
In a 2016 indictment from the U.S. District Court docket in Washington, D.C., unsealed late 2022, prosecutors say Daniel Duggan conspired with other folks to deliver teaching to Chinese navy pilots in 2010 and 2012, and potentially at other occasions, without making use of for an suitable license.
Prosecutors say Duggan been given about nine payments totaling all over 88,000 Australian pounds ($61,000) and intercontinental journey from another conspirator for what was sometimes explained as “personal growth instruction.”
Boston-born Duggan, 54, has been in custody in Australia because Oct and appeared in a Sydney court docket Monday by video website link from a prison cell for a temporary listening to about a U.S. software to extradite him.
His lawyer, Dennis Miralis, explained to reporters outside the court docket that Duggan returned from China in 2022 to function in Australia just after he gained an Australian safety clearance for an aviation license. A couple of times after his arrival, the clearance granted by the Australian Protection Intelligence Organisation, the nation’s major domestic spy agency, was eliminated, Miralis mentioned.
“It’s putting to us that a sequence of gatherings like that could arise,” Miralis said. “We are discovering at this stage whether or not he was lured back again to Australia by the U.S., where the U.S. realized he would be in a jurisdiction where he would be capable of becoming extradited back again.”
Duggan served in the U.S. Marines for 12 decades ahead of immigrating to Australia in 2002. In January 2012, he received Australian citizenship, picking out to give up his U.S. citizenship in the system.
The indictment suggests Duggan traveled to the U.S., China and South Africa, and presented some schooling to Chinese pilots in South Africa.
Duggan has denied the allegations, saying they were political posturing by the United States, which unfairly singled him out.
His future court appearance is established for Might 1.