Nygard back in court Tuesday to seek bail after two-week adjournment

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This article was published 18/01/2021 (2023 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Disgraced fashion mogul Peter Nygard will appear in a Winnipeg courtroom Tuesday to seek bail while awaiting a potential extradition to the U.S. on sex-trafficking and racketeering charges.

Nygard, 79, last appeared before Manitoba’s Court of Queen’s Bench on Jan. 6, when his bail application was adjourned for two weeks so lawyers for the attorney general of Canada could review extradition documents and affidavits from his defence team. The hearing resumes Tuesday and continues Wednesday. Nygard will appear by video, as he did earlier this month.

A nine-count indictment filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York alleges Nygard, alongside business associates and co-conspirators, engaged in a “pattern of criminal conduct involving at least dozens of victims” in multiple countries from 1995 to 2020.

Nygard was arrested on an extradition warrant Dec. 14, 2020 in Winnipeg. He was held at the Winnipeg Remand Centre before being transferred to the Headingley Correctional Centre.

Scott Farlinger, counsel for the attorney general of Canada, has said he intends to oppose Nygard’s release on bail on the grounds that he poses “a serious risk of flight and is a risk to offend while on release.”

Jay Prober, one of Nygard’s attorneys, has said his client is not a flight risk and — due to medical conditions and his advanced age — is at serious risk for health complications if he remains in custody during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Nygard was the subject of mounting rape and sexual misconduct allegations throughout 2020.

On Feb. 13, 10 women filed a class-action lawsuit in a Manhattan court accusing Nygard of drugging, raping and sodomizing them. Some of the accusers were minors at the time of the alleged offences.

Later that month, special agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, alongside detectives from the New York City Police Department, raided Nygard’s international headquarters in Times Square.

Two of Nygard’s sons filed a lawsuit against him in August 2020, alleging he had a sex worker rape them when they were minors.

Nygard is accused of running a sex-trafficking ring that targeted women and girls from “disadvantaged backgrounds” who had a “history of abuse.” He’s alleged to have silenced victims with “threats, false promises of modelling opportunities” and “other coercive means.”

The allegations have not been proven in court. Speaking through his lawyers, Nygard has repeatedly maintained his innocence.

ryan.thorpe@freepress.mb.ca