A HITMAN convicted of murdering a man acquitted in the 1985 Air India bombings has been sentenced to life in prison in Canada. The bombings had killed 331 people.
Tanner Fox and his accomplice, Jose Lopez, pleaded guilty last October to the second-degree murder of Ripudaman Singh Malik.
The two admitted to being paid to carry out the July 2022 shooting in a Vancouver suburb but have not disclosed who hired them.
Lopez is set to appear in court again on 6 February.
Malik and his co-accused, Ajaib Singh Bagri, were acquitted nearly two decades ago due to a lack of evidence in the case.
The 1985 bombing of Air India Flight 182 off the coast of Ireland killed all 329 passengers and crew. It was the deadliest act of airborne terrorism before the 11 September 2001 attacks in the United States.
On the same day, another bomb exploded at Japan’s Narita airport, killing two workers who were loading baggage onto an Air India flight.
Both suitcase bombs were traced back to Vancouver, which has a large Sikh immigrant population.
Inderjit Singh Reyat is the only person convicted in connection with the plot. He was found guilty of making the bombs and for lying at the trials of Malik and Bagri.
The attacks took place during an Indian crackdown on Sikh separatists. Those responsible were alleged to have been seeking revenge for the storming of the Golden Temple in Amritsar by Indian troops.
(With inputs from AFP)
