Bruce Golding

U.S. officials say they are looking forward to Jamaica’s response to a series of extradition requests for nationals suspected of committing crimes in the U.S.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Arturo Valenzuela told reporters that Washington is pushing for greater effectiveness of the Proceeds of Crime Act to defeat organized crime in Jamaica.

“There is a series of extraditions that the United States has requested, and we look forward to those being processed,” he said, amidst media reports that law enforcement officials in Washington had prepared two unsealed indictments relating to the case against Coke, who was extradited to the United States last month to face gun and drug trafficking charges.

Sources say the list includes a number of politicians, high profile persons and law-enforcement officers and some may be linked to the investigation of Coke.

Washington had expressed its displeasure at the Bruce Golding government’s initial position regarding the extradition of Coke, and Valenzuela who is on a visit to three Caribbean countries, said diplomatic relations between the two countries were “as good as they have ever been”.

“We value very strongly the relationship with Jamaica. We may have had a bump in the road with regards to some issues having to do with the extradition, but, we are happy with the way in which we cooperate with Jamaica and look forward to strengthening that relation as we move forward,” he said, urging greater support for the Proceeds of Crime Act.

“This Act allows the Government to seize the assets of those involved in organized crime, and is one of the clearest ways to demonstrate to all Jamaicans that crime does not pay,” Valenzuela said.

Earlier, Charge d’Affaires at the US Embassy here, Isiah Parnell, told reporters that the two countries have an extradition treaty that has been in effect for more than 20 years.

“It worked successfully for that time; we extradite, 12 to15, 20 persons per year; that continued even when we had the problem with the one high-profile extradition,” Parnell said.

“Now that this high-profile extradition is over, we will continue to work together with the law enforcement community and as extraditions arise on either side, from either country, we will process them,” he added, even as he refrained from indicating how many more persons were likely to be extradited.

“I would not say there is an (increasing number). The range has been between 10 and 20 a year and some of them happen quickly,” he said.

Parnell was tightlipped about whether the new requests included politicians, opting instead to say that it was not the practice of the embassy to comment on any specific requests, and that there was no outstanding backlog of requests to be processed.

Valenzuela has already met with Prime Minister Golding and Foreign Minister Dr. Kenneth Baugh. (CMC)

National Weekly contributed to this article.