U.S. FUGITIVE GETS DATE FOR HEARING

Allen Richardson, the West Vancouver man wanted in New York state for
escaping from a prison work camp 28 years ago, will finally be given a
chance to convince Canada to let him stay.

Immigration authorities ordered Richardson out of the country at a hearing
on January 21, 1999 for entering Canada with a criminal record and lying
about his identity.

But his deportation was put on hold because he claimed refugee status. His
hearing was originally scheduled for January of this year but was
postponed. Last week, he was sent a notice to appear at the Immigration
and Refugee Board's downtown offices on April 25.

Richardson's wife, Amalia, who has breast cancer, said she knew little
about the hearing, but said waiting for a decision from the government has
been difficult.

"It isn't easy," she said Sunday. "We have to work our way through it and
hopefully, at some point, we'll get the whole business resolved. But it's
been very harsh on both of us."

Richardson, 50, lives with his wife in West Vancouver and works as a lab
technician. He also volunteers with the SPCA.

As a college student, Richardson was convicted of selling $20 worth of LSD
to an undercover police officer and sentenced in 1971 to four years in prison

He was originally sent to Attica, and later transferred to a work camp,
where he fled after serving only a few months of his sentence. The Attica
riots, in which 43 prisoners died, occurred just weeks after Richardson was
transferred to the work camp.

In 1998, the RCMP was tipped off by U.S. authorities that Richardson was in
Canada and he was arrested.

Last fall, Richardson's lawyers asked a judge in Rochester, NY to reduce or
vacate his prison sentence, because of his law-abiding life in Canada.

But last November, the judge refused, urging Richardson -- who was known in
New York as Christopher Perlstein -- to "take personal responsibility" for
his crime and return to the U.S.

What has followed that decision has been a complex legal stalemate.

Howard Relin, the district attorney in Rochester, has said some arrangement
could probably be made for Richardson to serve his sentence in a Canadian
prison.

But Richardson has not been extradited to the U.S. His removal from Canada
is based on him having broken Canadian laws, not U.S. ones.

Therefore, Richardson's lawyer, Michael Bolton, is urging Immigration
Minister Elinor Caplan to give Richardson a special ministerial permit
allowing him to stay in Canada.

So far, the ministry has not issued such a permit.

Richardson's only other hope is that his refugee claim will be successful.

His immigration lawyer, Alex Stojicevic, said Richardson is claiming
refugee status because he believes the sentence he received in 1971 was
unduly harsh because of his involvement in anti-Vietnam War activities.

The odds, however, are not in Richardson's favour.

The IRB typically does not see those fleeing the United States as
legitimate refugees. Only a handful have ever been successful.

Even Stojicevic conceded in an interview last year that "less than one per
cent" of all U.S. refugee claims are successful.