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Imprisoned Cruiser in Legal Limbo

On Thursday, the government of Tonga officially requested extradition of American cruiser Dean Jay Fletcher, 54, to stand trial in that island nation’s capital, Nuku’alofa, for the alleged murder of his Canadian wife Patricia Linne Kearney last summer.

Regular readers may recall the bizarre sequence of events that led up to Fletcher’s apprehension in early October at Pago Pago, American Samoa, and his subsequent transfer to US authorities soon afterward (due to an extradition treaty). After alerting authorities in Vava’u, Tonga, about his wife’s death (no details yet released), Fletcher was eventually accused of killing her himself. But somehow he escaped from custody — an act for which five Tongan police are being investigated — then made his way to his vintage Rhodes Bounty 42 Sea Oak, and headed out to open sea. He was chased, but scared off his pursuers with a flare gun. A few days later he made the mistake of pulling into Pago Pago for fuel. After another chase, he was apprehended by authorities there. 

Our understanding is that Fletcher has been held in a Hawaiian detention facility ever since, during which time he filed a writ of habeas corpus (essentially demanding clarification on the evidence against him.)

Fletcher and Kearney had set sail for the South Pacific from Mazatlan in the spring of 2015. Acquaintances within the Mexican cruising community are still in shock over both the murder and the accusation that Fletcher did it. "They were quiet but friendly folks who kept mostly to themselves," says an anonymous source in Mazatlan. "I personally can’t imagine him killing her.”

Tonga practices British common law. If Fletcher is extradited and convicted, he could face the death penalty via hanging — although the last execution in this low-crime archipelago was in 1982, according to Cornell Law School research.

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