Pubdate: Fri, 16 Nov 2012
Source: Winnipeg Free Press (CN MB)
Copyright: 2012 Winnipeg Free Press
Contact: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/opinion/send_a_letter
Website: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/502
Author: Bruce Owen
Page: A3

A DAUGHTER PLEADS FOR MERCY

Terminally ill convict wants to return home to U.S. to
die

They want to take him home to die when they return to the United
States on Monday, but that's highly unlikely.

There is nothing on the books in Canada that allows a cancer-ridden
Ian Jackson "Whitey" Macdonald to cut short his two-years-less-a-day
conditional sentence, a term he's serving for his part in an
international dope-smuggling scheme shut down by RCMP in 1980.

"It's an over 30-year-old case. He's sick. He's dying, and I think he
needs to go home," his daughter Lisa Alexander said Thursday.

"There needs to be compassion here. I don't understand why they would
hold him here."

Macdonald, 73, is confined mostly to a bed at Fred Douglas Lodge. His
medical records show he suffers from prostate cancer, heart disease,
Type 2 diabetes and the slow loss of his mind. In the past five
months, he's lost almost 50 pounds.

Thirty years ago, he became Winnipeg's most famous fugitive when he
was arrested in Florida for running a series of deals in which he'd
ship 15-kilogram bales of marijuana to Canada through a network of
associates. The drugs were from Colombia.

The same case saw then-MLA Bob Wilson arrested, impeached and kicked
out of office -- the first and only time that's happened in Manitoba
- -- for his part in the scheme. Wilson was convicted by a jury and
sentenced to seven years in prison.

To this day, Wilson claims he was innocent and wrongly
convicted.

But before Macdonald could be sent back to Canada to be prosecuted, he
escaped.

In January 2011, U.S. marshals tracked him to Homosassa, Fla., where
he was living with his wife under the name Jack Hunter.

He was arrested and returned to Canada, where he pleaded guilty on
Sept. 7, 2011.

Because of his poor health, he was sent to a nursing
home.

Since his capture, he's reunited with his children, who hadn't seen
him since 1980.

Alexander and her sister, Kelly Weiss, who both live in the U.S., say
visiting their dad is heart-breaking because his health is quickly
deteriorating.

They've appealed to Canadian and American authorities, including Prime
Minister Stephen Harper, to allow him to return to his Pennsylvania
home.

"He has about 10 months left in the nursing home," Alexander
said.

"I don't think he's going to make it. I believe everybody needs
compassion. This is a humanitarian situation."

Because Macdonald is serving a conditional sentence, there are no
allowances under Canadian law for an early release.

Alexander said she believes Canada can grant her father clemency and
release him. But she has to prove Macdonald can cross the border and
that the U.S. will accept him.

She said it's a lengthy process and her father doesn't have that much
time.

"There's not time for red tape," she said.

Alexander also produced a document that shows in the late 1970s, her
father was an informant with the U.S. Customs Service, providing
"reliable information in the area of large-scale narcotics smuggling."

The letter, addressed to the director of the U.S. Immigration and
Naturalization Service in Miami, was written by Michael Wewers, now
retired from the U.S. Customs Service, on behalf of an investigator to
whom Macdonald reported.

Alexander said this information, unknown to Canadian authorities until
now, shows her father was a police agent and should have never been
arrested in the first place, let alone convicted and put under house
arrest.

Wewers, now an ordained minister, said he could not comment on what
information Macdonald passed on to authorities, but the convict should
be released on compassionate grounds.

"As a compassionate Christian, I agree that he should be allowed to
come back, spend whatever days he has left in Pennsylvania and quietly
go away," Wewers said, adding Macdonald had led a law-abiding life
until he was arrested in 2011.

"He's been reunited with his children and I understand they have some
mixed emotions because of his activities, but it sounds like they've
forgiven him.

"And after 30 years of not breaking the law, now dying of cancer, why
can't he just go home and die?"
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