Criminal defense attorneys for two Indians, arrested for trying to circumvent US export control laws to send technology to India without the required licences, will try to get the case moved to South Carolina, where the original indictments and arrests were made.
Federal officials have said this is unlikely to happen.
On April 3, the Federal Bureau of Investigation made public that Parthasarathy Sudarshan, 46, and Mythili Gopal, 36, both of Simpsonville, South Carolina, had been indicted and arrested on March 23, 2007, on charges of supplying India with controlled technology without the required licenses.
Sudarshan and Gopal are the founder and chief executive officer and the international sales manager respectively of Cirrus Electronics. The arrests were the result of a joint investigation by the FBI, the Department of Commerce, and the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
The 15-count indictment, which was returned by a federal grand jury in the District of Columbia, charged the defendants with violating the International Emergency Powers Act and the Arms Export Control Act and with acting as illegal agents of a foreign government.
Beattie Ashmore of the law firm of Price, Paschal & Ashmore and Jack Read of the Read Law Firm, the attorneys for Sudarshan and Gopal respectively, told India Abroad that when the status hearing and arraignment is convened April 17 in the US District Court in Washington, DC, they will formally move to file a motion to shift the case to South Carolina where both their clients reside, even though Sudarshan holds a Singapore passport.
But sources in the US Attorney's office in DC said this is unlikely and pointed to the tough stand taken by US Magistrate Deborah Robinson when during the detention hearing on April 12, she summarily dismissed a request by Ashmore that the case be moved to South Carolina and also refused a bail application for Sudarshan, despite his attorney surrendering his Singapore passport to the court and assuring Robinson that Sudarshan was not a flight risk.
At this preliminary detention hearing, it was revealed that Sudarshan was a valid passport holder of Singapore, which expired only in July 2014, although when the FBI arrested him last month in South Carolina, it had seized his 'expired' passport issued by the Singapore government, according to Ashmore.
Sudarshan, who was led into the courtroom by a US marshal, was wearing the usual bright orange jumpsuit given to individuals arrested and held in remand without bail and during the entire hearing stood silently with his hands clasped behind his back, only once consulting briefly with Ashmore during the start of the proceedings.
In his bail plea, Sudarshan's lawyer said that besides surrendering his passport, Sudarshan was not a flight risk because his wife, a physician and their high-school age son reside in South Carolina.
Gopal, who was named as a co-conspirator in the indictment, however, was granted bail on her own recognisance.
