The alleged Calgary drug kingpin linked by U.S. authorities to a massive international cartel suspected to have been run by a retired Canadian Olympic snowboarder will renew his bid for freedom pending an extradition hearing, court heard Friday.
Lawyer Chad Haggerty, one of the counsel representing Allistair Chapman, said he anticipates he’ll set a date for a bail review when his client’s case is back in Court of King’s Bench next week.
Haggerty told Justice Shane Parker that lead counsel Noel O’Brien has received the record of the case from the applying state, California, and has to review it to determine if any preliminary applications will be made.
“The next thing that has to happen in this case is setting dates for any applications,” Haggerty said.
“Mr. (Colin) LaRoche’s office is aware that there will be, likely, disclosure applications forthcoming,” he said of the department of justice lawyer handling the matter.
The lawyer said they have reached out to Justice Paul Jeffrey, who denied Chapman’s initial bail application last month, to determine available dates for a bail review.
Under the Criminal Code, an accused may seek a review of a decision denying judicial interim release if there is a change of circumstances in the case.
The provisional arrest warrant out of California used by Canadian authorities to arrest Chapman alleged five charges against him, including conspiracy to commit murder and conspiracy to traffic in narcotics.
But in the authority to proceed filed by the federal attorney general’s department on behalf of the U.S., only one offence, conspiracy to commit murder, is listed as the allegation which corresponds to a similar crime in Canada, as required under the extradition agreement.
One of the allegations against Chapman, who Calgary police once suggested led a local drug organization although he was cleared of any criminal charges, is that he paid the owner of a website $10,000 on behalf of a drug trafficking organization to post information about Jonathan Acebedo-Garcia being a rat. Acebedo-Garcia was fatally shot more than a year ago in a Medellin, Colombia, restaurant.
He was believed to have turned on the drug cartel allegedly run by Ryan Wedding.
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