Air India bomb maker Inderjit Singh Reyat has lost an appeal of his conviction for perjury at the trial that ended in the acquittal of his two alleged co-conspirators.
Defence lawyers argued jurors were mis-instructed on how to consider the Crown’s case that he lied 19 times under oath in an attempt to hide his knowledge of the terrorist plot.
But the B.C. Court of Appeal ruled the trial judge made no error and rejected the appeal.
Reyat was sentenced last year to nine years for perjury but is still separately appealing the sentence as unjust.
He was the only person ever convicted and jailed in Canada in connection with the 1985 bombings that killed 329 passengers on Air India flight 182 over the Atlantic Ocean and two baggage handlers at a Tokyo airport.
Reyat, the admitted bomb maker, was supposed to testify for the Crown at the 2005 trial of Ripudaman Singh Malik, the millionaire founder of the Surrey Khalsa School and the Surrey-based Khalsa Credit Union, and co-accused Ajaib Singh Bagri, a sawmill worker from Kamloops.
But after 347 days in court and $130 million spent, the Air India trial concluded with with insufficient evidence to convict the two men.
Reyat had already served 10 years for manslaughter in the deaths of the Tokyo baggage handlers and a further five years for manslaughter and aiding in the construction of a bomb in the flight 182 bombing.
