Hassan Diab’s Long Odyssey Of Injustice Continues
Justice for Hassan Diab
Dear Friends and Supporters,
We are shocked and outraged by the French Court of Appeal decision on 27 January 2021 to refer Dr. Hassan Diab's case to trial, three years after a lower court set him free because of overwhelming evidence of his innocence. The decision of the Court of Appeal is the continuation of a long odyssey of injustice that Hassan and his family have endured for more than 12 years. Hassan's French lawyers plan to appeal the decision to France's Supreme Court.
In 2018, French investigating judges dismissed the case and released Hassan from prison due to lack of evidence. Since then, the case has only grown weaker in light of further exonerating evidence. Another handwriting analysis commissioned by the French Court of Appeal delivered a scathing critique and rebuke of the "Bisotti report" that was used to extradite Hassan from Canada in 2014. Witnesses and documents prove that Hassan was in Lebanon writing his university exams at the time of the 1980 bombing. Hassan's fingerprints, palm prints and physical description do not match those of the suspect.
After more than 40 years and since no one was indicted, the French Court of Appeal is clinging onto Hassan Diab to keep the case going. The victims of the 1980 Rue Copernic bombing and their families deserve justice, but this cannot be achieved by subjecting an innocent man to a trial. French authorities would better serve the victims and their families by trying to find the true perpetrators of this awful crime.