I was shocked at this story and disgusted by what the Canadian police and govt. did to this man. I cannot believe this happened in Canada

NORTHERN EXPOSURE
Missing son prompts feds to investigate
Former cop reports Canadian prison torture, family's disappearance--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted: March 25, 2008
9:25 pm Eastern


Eddy, former New Jersey police officer Scott Loper's son before Loper was jailed in Canada


By Bob Unruh
© 2008 WorldNetDaily


The U.S. State Department has opened an investigation into the disappearance of the wife and son of a U.S. citizen who was jailed for four years in Canada on charges he describes as trumped-up.

Eddy, former New Jersey police officer Scott Loper's son before Loper was jailed in Canada

WND reported earlier on the case of former New Jersey police officer Scott Loper, who described stumbling upon an alleged police-run drug ring in Canada, then his sudden jailing and the abrupt disappearance of his wife and son, Edward.

State Department officials, as well as officials from the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs, continue to decline to respond to WND inquiries about the status of an investigation into Canada's treatment of Loper. Canada has admitted it failed to follow international conventions and notify the U.S. of Loper's criminal charges and imprisonment, even after he requested notification.

However, a letter from Barbara J. Greig, with the International Parental Child Abduction Unit in the State Department, has confirmed that her investigation has been launched.


"I am writing in response to my telephone conversation with you of February 22, 2008, regarding your child, Edward Loper, who may still be alive in Canada. I am the officer responsible for cases in Canada for the International Parental Child Abduction Unit of the Office Children's Issues. International parental child abduction is an issue of great concern to the Department of State. We place the highest priority on children who have been victimized by parental or State abduction. I have already opened a case in the name of Edward Loper that will remain open until you gain access to him or all possible efforts have been exhausted," she said.

Loper, who told WND his son Eddy now would be 11 years old, was returned to the U.S. after he served a four-year prison term for "domestic" charges he believes were trumped up to silence him after he discovered the alleged cop-run drug ring.

WND previously reported members of Congress have asked the State Department to investigate his claims.

That request came in light of President Bush's advocacy, on which WND has reported, on behalf of a confessed murderer in Texas who is challenging his convictions and sentences on the grounds he is a Mexican national and was denied access to Mexican consular services during his case.

In that case, the Bush administration submitted a brief to the U.S. Supreme Court arguing to overturn the death penalty of Jose Medellin, who confessed in 1993 to participating in the rape and murder of two Houston teenagers. Jennifer Ertman and Elizabeth Pena were sodomized and strangled with their shoe laces, and Medellin bragged about keeping one girl's Mickey Mouse watch as a souvenir of the crime.

The U.S. Supreme Court announced its decision yesterday that the state of Texas had handled the prosecution properly, but Loper's desire for a full investigation was unabated.

Requests for an investigation have been submitted to the State Department by U.S. Reps. Steny Hoyer and Rob Andrews, and Loper is working with civil rights lawyer C. Scott Shields of Media, Pa., on his case.
The confirmation that Canada prosecuted and jailed Loper without notifying the U.S. came from Kenneth M. Durkin, the chief of Western Hemisphere Division in the Office of American Citizens Services and Crisis Management at the State Department. He wrote to Hoyer confirming that, but he then expressed an inability to pursue the case further.
"We were able to confirm his conviction and subsequent prison term for criminal harassment," the letter to Hoyer said. "Canadian Authorities did not notify the U.S. Consulate General or the U.S. Embassy in Ottawa of Mr. Loper's incarceration, and as a result we were not able to provide him with any Consular services. However, we have reminded the local authorities of the importance of consular notification when U.S. citizens are arrested."

The letter from Greig outlined the procedures for Loper to follow to his search for his wife and son.

"Although I am well aware of the horrific circumstances surrounding your case, this (request for help) must be in your own words," she advised for one of the application procedures. "Given the circumstances as described to me over the phone by Congressman Hoyer, if Edward is alive and located, it is unlikely that he would be allowed by the Canadian Government to travel to the U.S. for physical contact. You must be prepared for that, as well as the possibility that your Son is no longer alive.

"If Edward is alive, and there is no possibility of a voluntary access agreement, you will need to retain an attorney in Canada to pursue your Hague application through the Canadian courts. The State Department will assist you," she wrote.

Two different officials within the State Department who have access to information about Loper's complaint over his jailing and reported torture have told WND they cannot talk about the situation.

A spokeswoman in Hoyer's office told WND, "We don't speak publicly about cases."

But word of Loper's situation was spreading.

On a Restore the Republic website, a commentator called Loper's situation, "absolutely insane."

"Kirralin23," a forum participant, said the situation is appalling.

"For the government to refuse to protect his rights as a U.S. citizen is equivalent to you or [me] not seeking prosecution of our best friend for raping our child. How could that individual remain our friend? How can our government remain cozy with a foreign goverment (sic) which has so viciously and unjustly attacked one of our citizens."

From "Taquoshi," came: "Canada is becoming more and more of a police state, from the seizing of firearms, to the enforcement of 'hate crime' legislation, 'universal' health care and now to the possible false imprisonment of a U.S. citizen without notifying the embassy and possibly the concealment of his wife and son. Oh, yeah, we really want to join together with them as part of a North American Union. Right!"

Shields said his client, Loper, has few options left if the State Department refuses to pursue his case, as apparently is happening. "Otherwise he'd have to go back into Canada and hire Canadian counsel and sue them there."

His client's case is a "cry out to the State Department to demand some accountability for [Canada] not notifying our government he was in custody to begin with. … They've admitted they didn't notify our government and still don't want to address the issues," he said.

"Our government can file a claim through the International Court of Justice. We [as individuals] cannot," Shields said.

"But for reasons, not told to me, other than apparently our federal current administration perhaps doesn't want to upset the Canadian government, they're not pushing it," he said.

"I don't even know how to classify the inaction on the part of our government now," said Shields.

The first response from the Canadian government, according to documents provided WND by Loper, was to deny that he was in Canada, had been the subject of a court case or was jailed there.

A letter shortly after Loper was returned to the U.S. and had started complaining about his incarceration references the denial.

"We have contacted the Consulate in Toronto to gain further information regarding Mr. Loper's incarceration. They have no record of this incident," the letter from Kees Davison, then chief of Western Hemisphere Division, said.

The admission later was forthcoming from Canada that the jail term for Loper was, in fact, reality.

But Loper said there appears to be something more at stake, because of the concerted effort to hide his situation. He also said that would align with what he saw during the rest of his case.

Loper, who had moved to Canada so his wife at the time could be closer to her family, said the whole situation was unsettling from the beginning. He was divorced from his original Canadian wife, then married his second wife, Carolyn.

While moving into a townhome, they were welcomed by a beer-drinking crowd in the next unit who identified themselves as police officers, one of whom later warned him that a neighbor on the other side was "under surveillance" as a possible drug dealer.

Loper's experience as a New Jersey officer alerted him, and he subsequently watched officers repeatedly sneak into the next-door unit. He bought some microphones and a tape recorder and installed the mikes so they would monitor what was going on, discovering that police officers in the Durham region allegedly were busting drug dealers being identified by his neighbor, then bringing the drugs to him for sale.

Before he could take his evidence to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Canada's federal police unit, he was busted by local police on trumped-up charges, taken to a mental health facility and detained, he said.

While he was confined, his townhome was ransacked, his tapes confiscated and his wife and young son disappeared. He recalls a last telephone call from Carolyn. "I love you but they'll take Eddy away!" were the last words he heard her say, Loper told WND.

Released from the mental facility after a few days, he found his wife and son gone, and when he tried to find them, found himself the subject of a restraining order. He tried to express his love for his wife and son in a letter to a friend, and authorities determined that was an attempt at an "indirect communication" and he was sentenced to prison for four years.

There, officers repeatedly tried to get him to admit that he was making up the claims about the police officers' drug connections. "There was a hot water radiator. They would spray me with that to get me to recant my story, to get me to stop saying it," he said.

He said he's been told stories of his wife now being in a witness relocation program, or considers the real possibility that she may have been part of the conspiracy to get rid of him in order to move forward with another man, possibly a police officer.

Back in the United States, he's remarried and pursuing another line of work. But he still is demanding justice for what he experienced.

"I was arrested and locked in a filthy cockroach infested solitary confinement with no light, no heat. I was starved, beaten, tortured with a scalding shower tapped off a radiator pipe while in a locked cage, and put into a steel coffin for weeks at a time…

"On numerous occasions as I asked and demanded to see a representative of the American government … I was laughed at by Canadian prison authorities…," he said.

"This is a clear violation of my Hague Rights and a violation of Treaties between Canada and the United States going back over 40 years … It is also a violation of international law," he said.

"However, I have been told … by The Western Hemispheric Director of The State Department, that the Bush Administration enjoys a very good relationship with Canada, and although they (Canada) DID violate Article 36, this will not be pursued," he said.




http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php? ... geId=59890