PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Priest Abuse Trial Blog
Ralph Cipriano
Judge M. Teresa Sarmina wants Msgr. William J. Lynn to sign an extradition waiver before she’ll consider letting him out of jail on house arrest.
The judge told lawyers in the case that she’s worried about the monsignor fleeing the Commonwealth to hide out at the Vatican. If the monsignor wants to get out of jail, he’ll have to sign the extradition waiver first. Then if he subsequently becomes a fugitive and is captured on Vatican soil, he cannot legally fight extradition back to the U.S.
Sounds like a plot for a TV potboiler, right? But the judge was serious, and so Lynn agreed to the request. The judge was crabbier than usual as she repeatedly lit into defense lawyer Jeff Lindy for mistakenly telling her last week that the monsignor does not have a passport. He does, although on Tuesday, the monsignor handed his passport over to the judge before he went back to jail.
The judge got things started at the hearing over house arrest by telling lawyers on both sides of the case that she wanted them to be civil.
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