French couple appealing extradition order

An appeal is being filed today against an extradition order by the Maltese courts on a French couple who escaped custody following convictions two years ago.

Alain Schmitt, 49, the spiritual leader of a French sect, and his 47-year-old fiancée, Laurence Liegeois were wanted by the French after they fled the country. A European Arrest Warrant was issued for them.

The couple also want to get married in Malta but while according to lawyer Emmy Bezzina the proceedings for a civil marriage are continuing, the Curia has said it could not allow the divorced couple to get married in any church or chapel because they did not satisfy the requirements of Canon Law.

Dr Bezzina told a news conference this morning he could not understand the reasoning behind the magistrate’s decision to extradite the couple when he knew that Mr Schmitt was found guilty in France without him even being present in the French court.

He was never convicted of torture as had been alleged and this was not even mentioned in the extradition procedures. Mr Schmitt was also 98 per cent blind and had a leg injury.

Dr Bezzina said that next week he would also be filing two separate constitutional cases. The charges his clients were facing in France, he said, were trivial, namely that Mr Schmitt formed part of a group.

He insisted that Minh, the group Mr Schmitt was leader of, was not a sect but a gathering of friends with a passion for martial arts who lived together as a community.

Minh is a martial arts character taken from a book written by Mr Schmitt himself, the lawyer said.

Members of the group told the news conference that France had enacted a law to dissolve any group or non-governmental organisation which they believed was a sect.

France was criticised about this law on the basis of discrimination. It was now trying to pass a new law prohibiting the use of bandannas and the growing of long beards since these could be considered to be religious signs.

Mr Schmitt’s son Mattieu said that in 2005 he was taken to court on similar charges to his father’s and with no proof whatsoever was jailed for 15 months. He appealed and the appeal is pending before the highest court in France.

Between January last year and last January, there were seven other similar cases in France.

Dr Bezzina again spoke about the inhuman and degrading treatment in French prisons, which, he said, led to a suicide every three days.

Asked why Mr Schmitt and his girlfriend wanted to get married so quickly, Dr Bezzina said Mr Schmitt only found out he was divorced in December and the two had been planning to get married after the festive season.

The civil marriage is still planned to go ahead and the couple were waiting for some certificates from the French embassy in Malta.

“They are not fugitives from justice but fugitives from injustice,” Dr Bezzina said.