I am very grateful for the opportunity to raise again in the House the case of my constituent, Mr. Giles Carlyle-Clarke. It will probably be helpful if I provide a little background to this case, which I think concerns a serious question of human rights. It is also no coincidence that most of the extradition cases that find themselves being discussed on the Floor of this House concern extradition to the United States.

By way of background, I should tell the House that my constituent, Giles Carlyle-Clarke, was extradited to the United States in 2006. He has served a short prison sentence in the US and is now living back in the United Kingdom. It will be recalled that there was an Adjournment debate on the case in this House on 24 March 2005, which can be found at column 1095 in Hansard. The then Under-Secretary of State at the Home Office, the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint), who is now unemployed—

She is working. She is still an MP.

She is still an MP, of course. On that occasion, she was reluctant to respond and it is also true that she sought Mr. Speaker’s assistance in trying to rule the debate out of order on the basis that it might be sub judice. Mr. Speaker supported my position and the debate went ahead, although the Minister was still reluctant to give answers to some of the questions that I raised. I know that she had reservations because she felt that she may have been operating in a quasi-judicial role. However, I believe that she was responsible to Parliament for the decisions that had been made, and that it was therefore appropriate that those decisions should be questioned here in the House.

The subject of this debate is the process behind the extradition of my constituent Mr. Giles Carlyle-Clarke. He was wanted by the US Government in relation to four charges involving the smuggling of cannabis into the US, and the possession of cannabis there, between 1983 and 1988. The charges therefore related to events that took place more than 20 years ago.

Mr. Carlyle-Clarke was extradited to the US in 2005, and I do not intend to deal with the case itself, but it is a matter of record that, in November 2006, in what I think is described as a plea bargain, Mr. Carlyle-Clarke pleaded guilty to charges of drug smuggling. In February 2007, he was sentenced to three years in prison. As I said earlier, he has now been released and is back in the UK.

The case that I put to the Minister at the time of the earlier debate was simple, and it has not changed. To extradite an individual for alleged crimes that the authorities claim took place between 17 and 22 years previously is unjust and oppressive, when that individual has been living openly and not as a fugitive from justice. He and his family have lived at the same address for several hundred years, and he had given that address as his principal residence for at least the 26 years previous to the case being heard.

As I said at the time of the previous debate, the decision is unprecedented, as it seems to ignore article 6 of the European convention on human rights, which states that everyone is entitled to a

“fair and public hearing within a reasonable time”.

The Americans had not given credible evidence that my constituent should be extradited. Their evidence was based on statements made by hardened criminals as part of their own plea-bargaining deals. In fact, Mr. Joel Cohen, a former US district attorney, said:

“In my opinion, the methods employed by the Government of the US through their Agent Baker and others in obtaining these three affidavits were not only quite wrong, but rose to the level of egregious misconduct.”

He also said that the effect of the American authorities’ actions had been

“effectively to destroy the fairness of any trial that Mr. Carlyle-Clarke may face.”

However, evidence has come to light since my constituent’s extradition to the US that shows that, at the very least, the US authorities misled the Home Office and, by extension, the judicial review conducted by Mr. Justice Pitchford in November 2004. Perhaps more worryingly, though, the British Government failed, either intentionally or unintentionally, to acknowledge that they knew that the American evidence was wrong.

Prior to his extradition, Mr. Carlyle-Clarke had lived and travelled openly, and that included visiting the US in the period since the alleged crimes had taken place. Moreover, until his conviction, he had a clean criminal record.

Central to the American authorities’ case was their claim that they did not know where Mr. Carlyle-Clarke was until the end of the 1990s. At the time of the earlier debate, new evidence before the Minister proved that the American authorities had in fact known his identity since 1988, and that they had known of his whereabouts since 1989. In fact, he had served a sworn affidavit on the American authorities in 1989 in which he gave the address in Dorset in my constituency where he had continued to live. He now lives there again, and I have seen a copy of that document.

The basis of the case that I made at the time was that Giles Carlyle-Clarke’s lawyers had made a new submission to the Home Office based on dramatic new evidence that had recently emerged in the US. His lawyers believed that that new evidence meant that the Home Office had to reverse its decision to permit his extradition to the United States of America, as the Home Office decision made in 2004 was based on information that turned out to have been untrue.

That new evidence revealed that the US authorities had, in fact, misled the Home Office. They claimed that they had no photographic means of identifying Giles Carlyle-Clarke until 1995. As he had claimed all along, and as was confirmed, the US authorities had a photo of him as long ago as May 1998. I have seen a copy of that photograph, which was acquired from the state’s attorney in the US. Accordingly, I claimed in the 2005 debate that the US authorities’ reason for delay in extraditing Giles Carlyle-Clarke lacked any credibility. I further asserted that there seemed to be no explanation for the US authorities’ delay in applying for the extradition of Giles Carlyle-Clarke until 1998 for alleged crimes committed between 17 and 22 years previously when they knew of his identity in 1988 and knew his address in 1989.

In their new submission to the Home Office, Giles Carlyle-Clarke’s lawyers also requested, under the Freedom of Information Act 2000, that the Home Office release in full its correspondence with the US authorities on the case. I had also written to a Minister to make the same request. In the 2005 debate, the then Under-Secretary, the right hon. Member for Don Valley, responded:

“The request is being considered under the freedom of information procedures, but questions to do with international relations require further analysis before we respond, which we are trying to do as quickly as possible. There is nothing sinister about that: it is simply a question of respecting legal confidences between states.”—[Official Report, 24 March 2005; Vol. 432, c. 1100.]

That is, it was a diplomatic nicety. In the light of the further evidence that has been revealed, I do not regard that as a satisfactory defence.

I do not wish to dwell too long on the evidence that I highlighted in 2005, save to repeat that Mr. Jefferson Dean, a US lawyer who had been retained by Mr. Carlyle-Clarke, discovered that a photograph of Mr. Carlyle-Clarke had been in the US authorities’ possession since 1988, not 1995 as they had previously asserted. In addition, as I have said, Giles Carlyle-Clarke signed a sworn affidavit that was served on the US authorities and gave his home address in 1989. The US authorities had therefore been able to identify Giles Carlyle-Clarke, and had known of his whereabouts, since 1988.

During a period of over six years between 1998 and Mr Carlyle-Clarke’s extradition in 2005, the legal process in this country required the then Home Secretary to consider the representations of both the US authorities and Mr. Carlyle-Clarke on the question of delay. However, the Home Secretary at the time persistently rejected Mr. Carlyle-Clarke’s version of events. In November 2004, he was informed of the Home Secretary’s decision to extradite him to the United States. Also in November 2004, Mr. Justice Pitchford held in the High Court that the Home Secretary was fully entitled to find, on the basis of the evidence before him, that the US authorities did not come into possession of the photograph until 1995 or thereafter, and that Mr. Carlyle-Clarke’s defence team was wrong to suggest that there was any evidence to the contrary.

As Mr. Carlyle-Clarke’s lawyers had not expected that interpretation of the evidence, they decided to instruct a US-based attorney, Mr. Jeffrey Dean, with a specific brief to find out what the truth was. During his investigation, Jeffrey Dean discovered the new evidence that I referred to at the time.

It might be considered odd that a Member of Parliament should, after a constituent has served a prison term on drug-smuggling charges—charges to which he pleaded guilty—again bring the case to the attention of the House. I do so not only because the earlier evidence points to an unfair and inhumane extradition, but because more evidence, which was made available at the time of the trial by the US prosecuting authorities, shows that there was clear evidence that the Government of the United States and Her Majesty’s Government had not only identified Giles Carlyle-Clarke, but were working together on the surveillance of his activities as early as 1987.

I have a copy of a three-page United States Drug Enforcement Agency investigation report, dated 30 January 1987. That, along with several other relevant documents, were made available to Mr. Carlyle-Clarke’s US lawyers in July 2006—after his extradition but before his trial. The document relates to a drug seizure off the coast of Mexico and refers to my constituent as “Giles”, but, more importantly, it identifies him as the owner of two vessels, including Can Can, which was the vessel involved in the charges on which Mr. Carlyle-Clarke was convicted. The report gave the vessel’s location as St. Petersburg, Florida, which is within the United States’ jurisdiction, and also identified it as a British-registered vessel, although I think that the phrase used was “flying an English flag”. The vessel was on the British Small Ships Register, and any inquirer would have had access to the owner’s name and address.

The second document, another DEA investigation report, dated 11 September 1990, is particularly relevant to the US and British Governments. By that date, both Giles Carlyle-Clarke and his yacht, The Can Can of Arne, to give it its full name, had acquired a DEA NADDIS file number. NADDIS stands for narcotics and dangerous drugs information system, and it is well known that Drug Enforcement Agency suspects have such file numbers. That September 1990 report clearly shows that HM Customs was working with the US Drug Enforcement Agency in the surveillance of Mr. Carlyle-Clarke and his yacht. Both agencies were clearly convinced that the vessel was being used for drug smuggling, and the British authorities suspected that it was being used to transport drugs to the United Kingdom. That document confirms not only that agencies of both Governments were watching Mr. Carlyle-Clarke, but the ownership of the vessel, which, although not specifically stated in the report, would have confirmed Mr. Carlyle-Clarke’s home address, and that of his mother, who also at one stage owned the yacht.

The key point, however, is that the final decision on the application by the United States Department of Justice for the extradition of Giles Carlyle-Clarke relied upon the submissions of the Alabama district attorney, David York, and the letter of his assistant, Gloria Bedwell, dated 25 February 2005. In it, she states quite categorically.

“The truth is that we did not know who Clarke was or where he was until after Agent Baker got the information from the United Kingdom in 1995. Period.”

It is a rather gruff way to write a letter but, none the less, that is how it was put.

I stated at the time of the previous debate that it was, to use a legal phrase, unjust and oppressive, by reason of the passage of time, for Giles Carlyle-Clarke to be extradited to the US. I understand, and I made this point at the time, from leading Queen’s counsel who specialise in this area of the law that if the case related to an extradition between Commonwealth countries, it would be held to be unjust on the basis of Mr. Carlyle-Clarke’s inability to deal with events so distant in the past, and oppressive because he has lived a new and blameless life in the intervening period. The Home Secretary of the time and Mr. Justice Pitchford accepted that there had been what could be described as a questionable delay, but it is now clear that they both relied on the United States Department of Justice evidence to which I have just referred: evidence that the United States authorities could not identify or locate my constituent until 10 years after the event. For reasons that have never been made clear, the proceedings for his extradition and eventual trial took another seven years to conclude.

That evidence—or lack of it—must now be described as both misleading and deficient. There is now indisputable evidence that the United States authorities knew all along who Giles Carlyle-Clarke was. They knew that he was the registered owner of the yacht involved in the offences; they had photographs of him dating from 1988 and a sworn affidavit that he had lodged in an associated case in 1989. All that evidence was available to the Home Secretary before his extradition. However, the Home Secretary chose to rely on the assistant district attorney’s statement that the authorities did not know who Mr. Carlyle-Clarke was until 1995, although they still took until 1999 to seek his extradition.

Documents are now available showing that the Drugs Enforcement Agency, the US Government agency responsible for collecting the evidence in drugs cases, had identified my constituent as early as 1987. Its representatives knew who he was. They knew the registration details of his yacht, and therefore his address and the location of his yacht—and therefore probably his whereabouts in September 1990. Not only that, but the British agency responsible for guarding our borders against such activity—Her Majesty’s Customs and Excise, as it was then known—also knew all that information, and was working with the United States authorities in pursuing my constituent and his then alleged drug smuggling activities.

That all begs the question whether when the Home Office refused to respond to my and Mr. Carlyle-Clarke’s lawyers’ requests under the Freedom of Information Act, it was not protecting some diplomatically sensitive material. It begs the question whether the Home Office was concerned that it would be revealed that Her Majesty’s Government knew that the statements given by US officials were untrue, that both Governments had full knowledge of Carlyle-Clarke’s activities as early as 1987 and that they therefore could not substantiate the claim that the extradition had been delayed because of a lack of knowledge about his identity and whereabouts.

I am not a lawyer, but I can tell when a citizen has been unfairly dealt with by Ministers and the courts. Although Mr. Carlyle-Clarke pleaded guilty to the original crimes and has served his sentence in prison, it still remains the case that the procedures surrounding his deportation could not be described as representative of justice. Those procedures were an affront to my constituent’s human rights, and I believe that he is owed an apology by both Governments for an extradition that he believes was obtained by deception. I expect nothing less than that apology from the Minister this evening.

Congratulations are due to the hon. Member for North Dorset (Mr. Walter) for raising this issue. As he said, he raised it in a previous debate on 24 March 2005, and I was aware of that as I prepared for this one. I can respond to the hon. Gentleman’s speech through my knowledge of the background and through confirmation, where possible, of his account.

However, I was not clear from his speech whether the letter to the Minister was a recent one or whether it was the letter written on the previous occasion. Similarly, I am not clear whether the freedom of information request that he referred to was recent or related back to the previous situation. Will the hon. Gentleman help me on that?

I am very willing to help. None of the correspondence to which I referred relates to recent events; it all relates to matters that took place before the extradition.

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that clarification; I am sorry that I did not catch it properly at the start. Let me come back to that in a moment.

I can confirm that the hon. Gentleman’s constituent, Mr. Carlyle-Clarke, was extradited to the United States in July 2006 to face charges concerning the importation and possible distribution of marijuana. The charges involved the smuggling into the United States, in the years 1986 and 1987, of several thousand pounds in weight of marijuana. He was alleged to have co-ordinated the delivery and distribution of a further quantity of drugs in Alabama in 1988. I think that the hon. Gentleman is in agreement on those facts.

I understand that following the extradition in 2006, the case was heard in 2007. Mr. Carlyle-Clarke was legally represented at the proceedings in the United States and, as has been described, pleaded guilty to the charge put to him, and was sentenced in February 2007 to three years’ imprisonment in the US. As was his right, he applied to be transferred to the UK to serve the remainder of the sentence in a prison here. He was transferred in July 2008, and released from UK custody in October 2008. I understand that he was on licence until May 2009; he is now no longer subject to any licence conditions.

The extradition proceedings, which are what the hon. Gentleman is concerned about, are of course long concluded, but I may be of assistance in giving the House a summary of those proceedings. Mr. Carlyle-Clarke fought extradition for several years, and the case was considered at all stages of the process. An arrest warrant was first granted against him by the district court in Alabama in 1992. Under the terms of the Extradition Act 1989, which was in operation at that time, he was provisionally arrested for extradition on 9 January 1998, and remanded on bail. On 4 January 1999, he was committed at Bow street magistrates court to await the Secretary of State’s decision as to his return, a prima facie case having been found against him based on documentary evidence and witness statements. He then applied for habeas corpus, but withdrew from that line of legal challenge on 10 November 1999.

Under the 1989 Act, the case fell to the then Secretary of State to decide whether to make an order for Mr Carlyle-Clarke’s return. Mr. Carlyle-Clarke was advised that he had the right to make representations by 2 December 1999 against that surrender. Under the procedures of the 1989 Act, in making such a decision as to surrender, the Secretary of State had to take into account not only statutory restrictions on return but, in the exercise of his discretion, any other reason why it would be wrong, unjust or oppressive to order return. The deadline for representations was subsequently extended, and they were received from Mr Carlyle-Clarke’s solicitors on 13 December 1999 and on 1 February 2000. They covered a wide range of matters. Inquiries were then made of the US authorities, followed by a very careful consideration of the representations, including a review of the case law cited in them.

In due course, an order for Mr Carlyle-Clarke’s surrender was signed on 3 July 2002. The solicitors then requested that they be allowed to make further representations, and this was agreed, taking into account all the circumstances. Extensive further representations were received on a number of occasions, and further information was received from the United States before reconsideration of the case could be then completed. On 27 November 2003, the decision to surrender Mr Carlyle-Clarke was confirmed. Subsequently, the case came before the courts once more, and on 26 November 2004, the High Court dismissed Mr Carlyle-Clarke’s application for judicial review, rejecting all the arguments that had been advanced on his behalf. Again, fresh representations were placed before the Secretary of State for consideration, but the earlier decisions were upheld on 28 October 2005.

Another judicial review application was dismissed on 16 June 2006, with the Court ruling that the claimant had got nowhere near establishing a case of a request made in bad faith, and that a challenge on the basis of the passage of time since the commission of the offences did not avail him. An application to the European Court of Human Rights was turned down on 29 June 2006, and hence the extradition took place the following month. I believe that the issues of fairness and proportionality were dealt with in the High Court case on 16 June, and I have explained its ruling.

This evening, the hon. Gentleman has explained new evidence about the case that he reports has since come to light. As he knows, the UK Government cannot interfere in judicial proceedings in another jurisdiction—and to be fair, I should add that he has not suggested that we should. It is not appropriate for me to comment even if, as in this case, the proceedings have been concluded. However, if he considers it appropriate, he could suggest that his constituent bring any new evidence relating to his involvement in the case to the attention of the relevant authorities in the USA, and seek advice from those who represented him.

I hope that the hon. Gentleman accepts that I cannot respond this evening to the new evidence that he has brought before the House. He has asked for an apology, but I suggest that if he wishes to pursue the matter he could write to me, perhaps enclosing a copy of the previous debate, of which I am now aware. We have the case file, of course. As I have said, it is impossible for me or the Government to interfere in the judicial proceedings of another country, and I know that he respects that fact.

As for the implication that the UK Government were either misled or complicit in misleading, either intentionally or unintentionally, I would have to come back to the hon. Gentleman on that. I would express to him the view that it is very difficult for me to comment on specific cases—but that is not said with any intention of blocking any request for information. He has done exactly the right thing on behalf of his constituent in bringing the case to the Chamber of this House, so that his constituent can have his case put through his MP. I look forward to his correspondence if he feels that that is the right way forward. I thank him, and I think that it is best if I leave it at that for this evening.

Question put and agreed to.