Former US Marine Corps pilot Daniel Duggan will be extradited from Australia to the US on charges of illegally training Chinese airmen. Australian Attorney General Mark Dreyfuss approved the extradition on Monday, ending a nearly two-year attempt by the 55-year-old Boston native to avoid return to the US
Duggan, who served 12 years in the Marines before immigrating to Australia and renouncing his US citizenship, has been in a maximum security prison since arrested in 2022 at his family home in New South Wales. He is the father of six children.
In a statement Monday, Dreyfuss confirmed he had approved the extradition but did not say when Duggan would be extradited to the U.S.
Warwick Ponder/Handout via REUTERS
“Duggan was given an opportunity to explain why he should not be extradited to the United States. In making my decision, I took into account all the materials before me,” Dreyfus said in a statement.
In May, a judge in Sydney ruled that Duggan could be extradited to the US, leaving an appeal to the attorney general as Duggan's last hope to stay in Australia. In a 2016 indictment in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., unsealed in late 2022, prosecutors said Duggan conspired with others to provide training to Chinese military pilots in 2010 and 2012, and possibly at other times , without applying for an appropriate license.
Prosecutors say he received payments totaling the equivalent of about $61,000 and foreign trips from another co-conspirator for what is sometimes described as “personal development training.”
If found guilty, Dagan faces up to 60 years in prison.
He denies the allegations. “We feel abandoned by the Australian government and are deeply disappointed that they have completely failed in their duty to protect the Australian family,” his wife Safrin Duggan said on Monday. “We are now looking at our options.”