Why was Jeffrey Epstein allowed into Canada in 2014?
Nearly six years after pleading guilty to a crime that should have made him inadmissible, Jeffrey Epstein visited Canada, and federal government officials are providing no answers about why he was allowed into the country.
Documents confirming Epstein’s travel to Vancouver in 2014 were among the three million pages released by the U.S. Department of Justice on Friday from its probe into allegations the convicted sex offender ran a child sex trafficking operation catering to the rich and powerful.
It’s unclear why Epstein was admitted to Canada, given his 2008 guilty plea and 18-month jail sentence on two prostitution charges, including soliciting prostitution from a minor.
Epstein, a U.S. citizen, was deemed inadmissible to Canada because he had been convicted of at least one crime that would constitute an indictable offence under Canadian law, according to an official letter from Canadian consulate in Los Angeles in 2018.
That letter rejected Epstein’s application for a temporary resident permit that would have granted him an exemption to travel to Canada despite his record.
Such permits “can be issued only in exceptional circumstances that might be best described as humanitarian and compassionate, or on occasion, when compelling Canadian interests are served,” says the April 4, 2018, letter.
“After a careful and sympathetic review balancing all the factors, I have determined that there are insufficient grounds to merit the issuance of a permit in your case,” it says.
Yet Epstein travelled into and out of Canada four years earlier, despite having the same convictions on his record.
No answers from federal officials
Documents released Friday show he had travel reservations for Vancouver from March 17 to 20, 2014, that he attended the TED conference in the city during those dates, and booked a massage at the Four Seasons hotel.
A U.S. Customs and Border Protection document released last month indicated that Epstein flew to Seattle from Vancouver on March 20, 2014.
So why was he allowed to enter the country on that trip? Federal officials aren’t saying.
CBC News asked Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada whether Epstein had applied for or been granted a temporary resident permit. The federal department referred all questions to the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA).
But the CBSA refused to say.
“We cannot provide comment on specific cases as a person’s immigration and border information is considered personal information and is protected by the Privacy Act,” said Guillaume Bérubé, the CBSA’s acting director of media relations, in an email Monday evening to CBC News.
“Admissibility of travellers is decided on a case-by-case basis and based on the information available at the time of entry.”
Chris Alexander, who served as Canada’s minister of citizenship and immigration in 2014, says he had no knowledge of Epstein’s visit.
“If he did come to Canada at that time, that was a very serious lapse in immigration enforcement,” Alexander said in an email to CBC News.
“Our government’s position was very clearly that any persons (including U.S. citizens) with criminal records were inadmissible, and that these provisions of the law should be rigorously enforced.”
Article source: https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/epstein-files-canada-immigration-visa-9.7071392?cmp=rss