At a detention review on Thursday, the IRB said that Tran will stay at the Calgary Remand Centre because he broke his release conditions and is considered a flight risk. The bonds posted for someone's release is forfeited to the Canadian government if release conditions are not met, according to the Canada Border Services Agency.
The Calgary police and the CBSA supported keeping Tran in custody. Calgary gang investigators said previous attempts on Tran's life and his gang involvement created security risks for both him and the public if he was freed. A permanent resident who moved to Canada in 1993, Tran racked up a criminal record in Calgary that includes two convictions for drug trafficking and one for assault with a weapon, so immigration officials issued a removal order for him on April 20, 2004. Earlier this month, Tran's appeals of the removal order led to a federal court ruling that granted him a new deportation appeal hearing. That review began late Thursday afternoon. At previous IRB hearings, Tran has pleaded his case as a hard-working glass cutter who earns $26,000 a year and has been paying taxes for the past seven years. Nguyen-Tran, known as Jackie Tran, listened by phone as proceedings took place to determine whether he breached release conditions set by Immigration and Refugee Board officials. Const. Scott Bertrand told the hearing he was looking for an offender behind a fight in Kensington about 1 a.m. on Oct. 25 -- just days after Tran was released -- when he noticed three men hurrying to an SUV. He said he pushed past a man he believes was trying to prevent him from approaching the SUV to question the men inside -- a Caucasian man bleeding from his hand in a rear seat, the driver and another man in the passenger seat who appeared drunk and didn't acknowledge police. He said he received driver's licences from the two more lucid men but made no arrests, as none of the SUV's occupants matched the description of the suspect.
While later running computer checks to confirm identities of the two men, Bertrand found they were in high-profile gangs while the intoxicated man with them matched a police photo of Tran. "I am 100% confident the person I dealt with in the vehicle was the same individual I reviewed in the photographs," Bertrand told the hearing. Tran was consequently arrested at his mother's home Tuesday night for breaching curfew. Jolene Fairbrother, one of Tran's lawyers, said Bertrand's evidence did not prove her 26-year-old client was caught in a breach. "We have a police officer in a dark alley who apparently saw a person with his eyes closed, his chin on his chest and then three days later going to Mr. (Tran) and saying 'that's you,' " she said. Immigration division member Otto Nupponen disagreed, ruling to keep Tran in custody until a Nov. 6 detention review hearing on grounds he's a flight risk and public danger. "He was in the midst of another violent-type situation or very close at hand, and found to be with known gang members," said Nupponen. CBSA hearing officer Dan Davidson suggested Tran's lack of commitment to the appeal process has seen him avoid deportation for four years.