'Honeymoon killer' out of jail

ABC News -  

American Gabe Watson is on his way to a Melbourne detention facility after being released from the Queensland jail where he served 18 months for his wife's manslaughter.

Immigration officers arrived to collect Watson at the Borallon prison, west of Brisbane, this morning. He was interviewed before being released into the custody of immigration officers who are expected to take him to the Maribyrnong Immigration Detention Centre in Melbourne.

The Immigration Department confirmed that Watson's plane left Brisbane Airport late this morning en route to a Melbourne detention facility.

But Watson will not be deported to the US until the Federal Government secures a guarantee that Watson will not face the death penalty if he is retried in his home state of Alabama.

Watson's wife Tina died while the couple was scuba diving during their honeymoon on the Great Barrier Reef in 2003.

Alabama's assistant attorney-general says the state has given a concrete assurance to the Australian Government that Watson will not face execution if he is retried in the US.

Don Valeska says he is perplexed by the Government's request for more guarantees, but says his office will do whatever it can to reassure Australia that Watson will not face the death penalty.

"No-one can change that position, not a judge, not the governor of Alabama, not the president," he said. "If the grand jury charged him it cannot be for a capital execution offence."

But the Federal Government has asked Watson to sign a document acknowledging he could face the death penalty when returned to the United States

Read more...

Photo Dave Hunt

Posted via http://batavia08.posterous.com batavia08's posterous