Both sides of the Meng Wanzhou extradition hearings are manoeuvring ahead of the scheduled resumption of proceedings on March 1, a court appearance this afternoon showed.
The previous unscheduled meeting saw Crown lawyer Robert Frater filing an application to remove one of the written reports by a technology expert - originally filed by Meng’s defence - from the abuse of process arguments expected to begin in March.
The report is an expert testimony on how an electronic device’s serial numbers can be used to obtain information on its individual owner/user. The Meng defence contends that U.S. authorities can access evidence about the Huawei Technologies CFO if they obtained a device’s serial number.
The Canada Border Services Agency has admitted it passed both Meng’s device and serial numbers over to the RCMP, although it is unclear if the information was then passed on to the FBI. The CBSA said the move was an unintended error; the defence argues it was part of an intentional effort to secure evidence for an eventual U.S. trial against Meng.
While Frater and defence lawyer Richard Peck have agreed to sort out what to do next in time for a case management hearing next Friday, Associate Chief Justice Heather Holmes said she is suggesting both sides agree to a statement of facts - using the report’s information in a broad and non-controversial way - to negate the need of the report all together.
“I think this may be getting unnecessarily far afield,” Holmes said of the details of the report being disputed. “... We can say that it’s hardly surprising that [serial numbers] can be used by authorities to get information on an individual. Surely, that’s the only point of importance to Ms. Meng's case... Surely, we don’t need to go deeper into what could be obtained and what couldn’t.”
Holmes added that she would like the hearings to maintain its current schedule of a resolution by May, and there are more pertinent questions the court must ponder than the detailed merits of the disputed report.
Meng is fighting extradition to the U.S. on fraud, money laundering and sanction violations charges. She has been in Vancouver since being arrested while connecting from Hong Kong to Mexico on Dec. 1, 2018.
