Fair trial demanded for Dollard man

BY RAFFY BOUDJIKANIAN

raffy.boudjikanian@transcontinental.ca

As former Dollard des Ormeaux resident Mohamed Kohail, 23, watched the clock tick closer to his death sentence appeal's deadline in a Saudi Arabian prison last Sunday, a bus full of like-minded protesters left Fairview Pointe Claire shopping centre for Parliament Hill in Ottawa, intent on asking Canada to do more for the young man.

Unless his appeal, which must be filed by the end of the month, is accepted, Kohail faces decapitation. He was involved in a schoolyard brawl in Jidda, Saudi Arabia which saw another participant, Munzer Haraki, 19, dead. Kohail's younger brother, Sultan, 17, has also been charged with the crime, but is currently out on bail.

"From what I understood nobody was able to say with certainty that Mohamed hit this kid and killed him," said Barry Gaiptman, 54, a guidance councillor at Cartier adult education centre in Beaconsfield, where Kohail was once a student. Gaiptman was one of several speakers who took to the microphone on Parliament Hill, asking for a fair trial. His school will put a showcase window at the entrance dedicated to Mohamed's cause, he mentioned.

"There is reason to believe they may be factually innocent," said Aubrey Harris, 32, Amnesty International's Canadian co-ordinator for their campaign to end the death penalty.

Mahmoud Al-Ken, a friend of Mohamed from his days at Concordia University, said even the trial that saw the older Kohail sentenced made use of an autopsy revealing Haraki died from "internal bleeding at the bottom of the stomach complicated by a weak heart."

Around 70 protesters turned up to listen to the speakers. It was a relatively quiet crowd, occasionally erupting into chants of "fair trial." Several seemed to know either one of the brothers or at least someone who knew them.

"I was very shocked (when I found out about the murder charge)," said Sana Abuali, a friend of Mohamed's older sister from their days attending Cartier together. In disbelief, she has been keeping in contact with the Kohails, who, as Palestinians, have no citizenship other than their Canadian nationality. "It's not easy for the family," she said, mentioning the boys' mother would often be in tears when speaking of them.

After gaining their citizenship in 2005, the Kohails temporarily moved back to Saudi Arabia, both because their sister, who had returned there earlier, was going to get married and also to be with a sick relative.

"He told me he was counting the days until he returned to Canada," said Mahmoud Younes, another close friend of Mohamed Kohail.

According to speakers, even if Kohail's appeal is granted, his chances of a fair trial are slim unless Canada intervenes. Al-Ken said his friend would most likely end up at a trial with the same judge and same witnesses that wound up prosecuting him in the first place. Even if the appeal was granted, he would have to next go through the Supreme Court. "Less than five per cent of sentences are reconsidered," Al-Ken said. "We have very limited time to act."

There were no representatives of the Canadian government among those who spoke. "We're happy they government is seeking clemency," said Harris, but Amnesty has also condemned Canada for a recent policy reversal that asks foreign diplomats to only do so in cases of death sentences in undemocratic countries, he reminded.

In a letter read to the crowd on his behalf, Pierrefonds-Dollard Liberal MP Bernard Patry called on the Canadian government to do more and encouraged the protesters. "It is critical to get the public together with their elected representatives," the letter stated.

Ahuntsic riding's Bloc Québecois MP Maria Mourani spoke at the event, and a letter by NDG-Lachine Liberal MP Marlene Jennings was read as well.

Warming up around a cup of coffee after the protest, speaker Rana Sayeb, who knows the Kohails through family ties, said the younger brother, Sultan, had always been a bit of a joker. A blurry cellphone video of the group brawl that started all this is available online. Sayeb identified a man being kicked in the face near the end of the short clip as Mohamed, and his aggressor as Munzer Haraki.

"We want this country (Canada) to move," said Gohrer Attaran, another friend of Mohamed's from high school days who is now a law student at Université de Montréal.

According to Harris, Saudi Arabia has an atrocious record when it comes to death penalties, killing around 100 people a year, half of them foreigners. In 2001, of 17 pardons granted, only two were issued to foreigners. Nationals often benefited from the influence of local leaders, "not something which is typically available to foreigners," he said.