U.S. Moves to Deport Ex-Argentine General

The U.S. attorney’s office filed a 1,500-page, 20-volume request in federal court here Wednesday on behalf of the Argentine government’s attempt to extradite former Gen. Carlos Guillermo Suarez Mason, one of Argentina’s most wanted fugitives.

The papers include allegations of 43 homicides and 24 cases of illegal deprivation of freedom attributed to Suarez Mason between 1976 and 1979. It also charges Suarez Mason with using a false passport.

The court on April 8 is to set a date for the start of the extradition hearing. Both Assistant U.S. Atty. Mark N. Zanides and Jack Hill, Suarez Mason’s attorney, predicted a long extradition process.

Suarez Mason, 63, was commander of the military region encompassing Buenos Aires during the period of the Argentine army’s “dirty war” against suspected leftists. In all, he has been charged with 177 specific crimes in Argentina and, if extradited and convicted, faces life in prison.

Suarez Mason fled Argentina when charges were brought against him after the end of military rule there in 1984. He has been held without bail since his arrest in late January in Foster City, a San Francisco suburb.

The attorney for Suarez Mason said he plans to request bail for his client. “He’s been living here quite some time under his own name,” Hill said. “I don’t think he’ll be going anywhere.”