Meng Wanzhou’s Vancouver mansions are not owned in her name, extradition hearing is told

The judge who issued the warrant for Meng Wanzhou’s arrest at the request of US authorities was not misled about her connections to Canada, and although Meng owned two multimillion-dollar houses in Vancouver, neither were listed in her name, a Canadian government lawyer said on Friday at an extradition hearing for the Huawei executive.

Meng’s lawyers have cited her properties and her frequent travel to Canada as evidence that the urgency of her arrest was overstated by the Americans, and that a Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) constable’s affidavit in support of the warrant, which said Meng had “no ties” to Canada, was misleading.

But Canadian government lawyer John Gibb-Carsley told the Supreme Court of British Columbia that Meng’s name is not on the title of either of the homes, which are in the neighbourhoods of Dunbar and Shaughnessy and are valued at C$4.6 million (US$3.7 million) and C$13.7 million (US$10.9 million) respectively. Meng is currently living under partial house arrest in the latter property.

“These homes are owned in Ms Meng’s husband’s name. Her name does not appear,” Gibb-Carsley, representing US interests in the long-running extradition case, told Associate Chief Justice Heather Holmes.

Although RCMP Constable Winston Yep did not conduct title searches to look for any Vancouver homes owned by Meng, said Gibb-Carsley, had he done so, he would have not been able to confirm her ownership.

Yep swore his affidavit supporting the US arrest request before Madam Justice Margot Fleming on November 30, 2018. Yep would arrest Meng at Vancouver’s airport the next day, sparking a diplomatic firestorm that threw China’s relations with Canada and the US into disarray.