May 5, 2002	Sunday	Safar 21, 1423

TORONTO, May 4: A top Saudi diplomat on Friday quashed rumours that a Canadian citizen had been handed a death sentence in Riyadh.

The Saudi Ambassador to Canada, Dr Mohammed Al-Hussaini, categorically denied in a newspaper interview that the Canadian, William Sampson, an accused in a car bombing in the Saudi capital, had already been tried in secret and sentenced to death.

“No final verdict has been issued and the judicial process is still going on,” he said.

Sampson, 43, was jailed in Dec 2000 in connection with two car bombings in Riyadh that killed a British citizen and injured five other people.

In February last year Sampson and two other foreigners _ a Briton and Belgian _ were shown on Saudi television confessing to involvement in the bombings.

“His confession will not be used against him in court and the man is unlikely to be executed,” Dr Hussaini told the Globe and Mail newspaper.

Moreover, Sampson, the ambassador added, has recanted his confession, and thus it will not be considered by the Saudi supreme judicial council _ a panel of five judges who will soon consider the Canadian’s fate.

The ambassador, who fears the Sampson case has hurt Canadian-Saudi relations, said he thought there was reason to be optimistic that even if the expatriate was found guilty of murder, he would not be beheaded, the method of execution in his country.

“Mr Sampson will be tried and his case will be dealt with according to the Saudi penal code, which guarantees fair trial and access to lawyers. This, I guarantee you, will take place,” the Saudi diplomat said.

In addition, he said, “confessions that were given before will not be taken against them unless they give it voluntarily at this stage” in front of the judicial council.

Mr Sampson, unlike his co-accused, has not cooperated with Saudi authorities, Canadian consular officials or his own lawyers, and has said he does not want to see his father, the ambassador was quoted as saying.

Asked if this behaviour might indicate a mental illness caused by stress, Hussaini said Sampson, an economist who was on contract with a Saudi industrial development agency, had been examined by doctors who found him of a sound mind.

The fact he has not cooperated with the authorities will not be used as evidence of guilt, Hussaini said.

Saudi authorities have suggested rival gangs of foreigners involved in bootlegging have been behind a series of bombings in Saudi Arabia.

The ambassador said the Canadian government had indicated it was not concerned with the final verdict in the case so long as the trial was just and fair.

If, at the end of the process, Sampson is convicted and sentenced to die, there are ways to avoid execution by paying “blood money” compensation to the family of the victim, Hussaini said.

A preliminary meeting with defence lawyers, prosecutors and judges was held 12 days ago.