Canadian Justice ... Justifying Passport Holder's Criminal Intent

"The applicant has established that a material component of the decision lacks intelligibility and is therefore unreasonable."

"The applicant states that he was  unable to report the theft of the first passport  until October 13, 2021, because the Beirut Embassy was closed on October 10 and 11, and on October 12, he was assigned an appointment at the Beirut Embassy for October 13."

Justice Richard F. Southcott

 

"The Passport Entitlement and Investigations Division (PEID) found there were] reasonable grounds [to believe Hatoum let his relative use his Canadian passport to enter Canada]."

"[It] also found the applicant provided false or misleading information when applying for a second passport."

"After reviewing the entry and exit stamps in both [passports] there were discrepancies in the storyline of [Hatoum's] travel history and the context relating to how and where [Hatoum's first Canadian passport] was lost or stolen."

"[Hatoum argued] the stamps in the passports do not demonstrate any discrepancies in his narrative as to his travels and the theft of the first passport. He suggests that the PEID confused stamps in the first passport related to his entry into and exit from Lebanon in October 2020 with other stamps related to such entry and exit in October 2021 ... and therefore developed concern that the period of time the applicant was in Lebanon did not match his narrative."

"[There] is nothing in the record to indicate that [it] was mistakenly relying on the October 2020 stamps as [Hatoum] suggests."

Passport Entitlement and Investigations Division 

"My passport and other needed documents were in a small bag that was stolen from me while I was asleep."

"I came from Syria to go to Beirut airport. I visited a rental place in Balsour in Lebanon on the way to relax before my flight to Canada as I was so early and so tired."

"I woke up to the [disappearance] of the host and my bag ... I searched everywhere."

Syrian-Canadian citizen Aiman Hatoum 

A Syrian-Canadian man Canadian immigration officials believed let his relative use his passport to enter Canada, then provided misleading information while applying for a replacement, has won a chance at Federal Court to get his passport back. Photo by TOM HANSON/The Canadian Press/File

 

According to Justice Richard F. Southcott, Canadian immigration authorities were not reasonable in refusing service for a five-year period to a Syrian-Canadian whom they believed allowed his relative use of his passport to enter Canada, according to a recent Federal Court ruling out of Toronto. Dual citizenship holder (Canada and Syria), Aiman Hatoum -- whose passports the Passport Entitlement and Investigations Division of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada revoked, refusing passport services to Aiman Hatoum for a five-year period -- decided to take the Attorney General of Canada to court.

 

Mr. Hatoum had been issued a Canadian passport originally in November of 2015. In October of 2021 he applied for a second passport at the Canadian embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, when he reported that his original passport had been stolen from him. He explained his attempt to "get hold" of his host at whose establishment he had been staying, and at the same time found the Canadian Embassy was closed, so he resorted to sending an email requesting guidance. 

During the hearing, Justice Southcott made note of the fact that Hatoum in his missing passport declaration, included the first name of his host, at whose place his passport had been taken, without identifying his host as a relative. Another, second passport was issued to Mr. Hatoum on October 25, 2021 at the Canadian Embassy in Beirut. It was only later that officials with the PEID discovered that Lebanese authorities had detained Hatoum for "investigative purposes after receiving information that the relative had used the first passport to travel to Canada on October 10, 2022".

 

As it  happened, that relative after making  use of Hatoum's passport to enter Canada, submitted a refugee claim in Canada on November 23, 2021 "declaring [Hatoum] as his representative and relative, and identifying  his residential information and telephone number to be the same as that of [Hatoum]". Hatoum, when the PEID began investigating "asserted that the relative had stolen the first passport and  used it to enter Canada without [his] knowledge. The relative has corroborated this assertion".

 

All of this led Canadian officials to believe they had "reasonable grounds to believe [Hatoum} permitted the relative to use the first passport to enter Canada without authorization. The PEID also found [Hatoum] provided false and misleading information when applying for the second passport", which led to the revocation of both passports and cut off any further opportunities for Mr. Hatoum to press for the return of his passports for a five-year period. The PEID pointed out that Mr. Hatoum failed to report his stolen passport until his relative entered Canada with it.

 

Justice Southcott avowed his "difficulty interpreting the decision" relating to the passport stamps. "The decision identified neither the particular stamps to which it is referring nor the resulting discrepancies in the applicant's narrative that were of concern." While accepting the PEID's logic that Hatoum failed to mention his passport missing, taken by a relative, indicated he was lying ... "However, it is not apparent from the decision that this logic forms part of the PEID's reasoning."

 

The man's case was sent back "to a differently constituted panel of the Passport Entitlement and Investigations Division for redetermination". So ends the saga of Canadian courts once again failing the standards of reasonable conclusions leading to citizens of refugee entitlement manipulating Canadian law and immigration standards to suit their own personal agendas, thus betraying and spurning Canadian law and cultural/social values.