As with so many things revolving around Jack Warner, there is news to rejoice and news to make you want to kick someone's chair over out of frustration. The good news is that the Attorney General of Trinidad & Tobago has approved the extradition request of the United States, sending the case to court. Now Warner must prove to a judge in T&T that he shouldn't be forced to face justice that he has dodged for decades.
The aforementioned bad news is that the case is adjourned until Friday as Warner's lawyers review the request for any mistakes so he can get off on a technicality.
Warner has been indicted in a federal court in New York on a dozen charges of racketeering, bribery, and other such corruption charges. There's little reason to call Warner innocent of anything as he has been caught many times violating FIFA rules (not to mention all kinds of laws) but was constantly "forgiven" by Sepp Blatter, the current lame duck president of FIFA. Warner was forgiven for reselling World Cup tickets for the 2006 and 2010 tournaments, a clear violation of FIFA statures that has current Secretary General Jerome Valcke suspended. The reason? Warner controlled all of the votes for the Carribbean Football Union, as well as votes from other countries around the world. This gave him incredible power; power that he used to enrich his coffers as well as those of his friends (such as Chuck Blazer, amongst others).
Warner was forced out after Blazer turned him in for bribing CONCACAF members to vote for Mohamed bin Hamman, a challenger to Blatter for president.
A real point of interest in this case is Warner's relationship with the former governing party in T&T, most of whom were ousted in recent elections in favor of the People's National Movement. Until those elections, Warner was an elected official who held at different times Minister of the Interior and Defense. While holding such high office, Warner used his influence to bring back the feared Flying Squad, a modern type of Gestapo that pillaged, raped, kidnapped and falsely charged people in the 80s. He used this squad to "fight crime" (i.e. political opponents) while enriching himself and friends through government contracts. He denied it when asked under oath, naturally. It comes as little surprise that Warner received less than 5% of the votes when elections were held earlier this year. It was Warner who helped found his party after his FIFA career came to an end and helped get many people elected, including Prime Minister Kamla Bissessar.
US Attorney General Loretta Lynch is dying to have a sit down with Warner and will be pushing hard to have his extradition handled smoothly and quickly. The man has no loyalty to anyone but himself and has all the knowledge needed to bring other FIFA and soccer marketing officials to justice, up to and most certainly including Sepp Blatter himself. To use an old saying, he knows where the bodies are buried because he put them there personally. If it means he won't die in prison (he's currently 72 years old), he'll gladly give up anyone and everyone he possibly can.