INDIA
Times of India

CHENNAI: Clearing the decks for the extradition of an Ooty-based fugitive priest – Fr Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul – to the US where he must stand trial for “first degree criminal sexual conduct”, the Madras high court has upheld his arrest and refused to quash it as illegal detention.

According to U.S. authorities Jeyapaul had sexually abused a 14 year old girl in 2004 while he was parish priest of a local church in Minnesota. He met the girl at a youth conference in 2004 and sexually abused her till 2005. Jeyapaul returned to India on August 31, 2005, to be at the bedside of his critically ill mother.

In 2011, the U.S. embassy sent a diplomatic note, requesting the union ministry of external affairs (MEA) to extradite Jeyapal to stand trial for the first degree sexual offence case, which it said, carries a maximum punishment…