B.C. dad cries cover-up as bizarre legal situation prevents pilot from being extradited to face charges

Cynthia Ching, 29, who worked at a Vancouver law office died six weeks after she was accidentally set alight with aviation fuel in the Australian outback in April 2004.

The University of B.C. graduate had sustained burns to 50 percent of her body at the Kings Creek Station in Central Australia.

Last August, Australian police in the country’s Northern Territory issued a summons for 21-year-old New Zealand pilot Edward John Woodhouse Lee to face court charged with a dangerous act causing death.

It is alleged that Ching had been engulfed by flames when ignited aviation gas being used as a makeshift lantern was inadvertently cast in her direction by Lee.

However, current laws mean Lee cannot be extradited from New Zealand.

Australian media said Crown prosecutor Nanette Rogers had announced that the charge against Lee had been withdrawn in Alice Springs Magistrates Court.

Rogers said there was no legislative equivalent of the charge in New Zealand, meaning authorities could not extradite Lee.

However, she did not rule out further action in the future as there was no statute of limitations on the charge.

"Should he come to Australia then the wheels of justice will start again," Rogers was quoted as saying.

When contacted at his Richmond residence, Ching’s father, Rapheal Ching said: “I find the whole issue extremely puzzling – if they drop charges against the very person who is responsible, who are they going to blame next?”

“How can they drop charges because a person cannot be extradited?” he told The Asian Pacific Post.

He also wonders why the authorities did not charge the pilot when he was in Australia. “This seems like a cover up. It shows the utter incompetency of the Australian authorities.”

A lawyer for the Ching family, Craig Paterson, also told Australian media by telephone from Vancouver that he was “not convinced they couldn't have extradited him."

The Asian Pacific Post first reported on Ching’s horrific death in April 2005 after it was kept under wraps for more than a year after the incident.

Ian Conway

Ching had just started work for Ian Conway, a powerful, well-known camel exporter, cattle rancher and resort operator, at Kings Creek Station, a sprawling outpost 450 kilometres southwest of Alice Springs. She was on a working holiday visa.

About a dozen people, including the backpacking Richmond residents, were gathered that evening outside the bunkhouse where two on-site helicopter pilots lived.

The veranda was lit by lanterns made of sawed-off beer cans containing a mixture of sand and helicopter fuel.

According to a cursory description of the accident in a workers‘ compensation form completed by Conway: “Pilot refilled a can, tipped it over — exploded. The fuel ignited the pilot‘s arm and he threw the fuel towards where the others were sitting and the ignited fuel landed on Cynthia.”

She spent the next two hours howling with pain, standing in the shower, covered in a plastic sheet, until a “flying doctor” plane landed on the ranch airstrip to take her to Alice Springs. From there, she was transported to the country‘s top burn treatment unit in Adelaide.

Rafael Ching and his lawyer traveled to Australia to look into the incident but were ordered off the remote station property. The station owner later apologized.

After the incident was reported in The Asian Pacific Post, Rafael Ching wrote a blistering letter.

“The following days to come after the burning, Ian Conway, the proprietor of the station, for some reason, did not meet nor inform his staff of the incident so as to immediately put a stop to this unimaginable and dangerous practice. Instead, he also managed to keep it a secret from the media and from the authorities. Kings Creek Station employs transient backpackers and has extensive presence on the internet, the medium used for getting a steady supply of workers. Ian Conway certainly profited from the backpackers. Was Cynthia just another disposable worker? A century ago, we called this 'slavery'. Tourism kills in the Australian Outback.”

Ching said he now plans to attend an inquest into his daughter’s death which is scheduled to be held in Alice Springs between March 6 and 9.

“There are so many inconsistencies in the day to day happenings of the case,” he said.

Meanwhile, New Zealand media said the suspect John Woodhouse Lee of Wellington claims he had never been asked to return to Australia.

"The whole time I was never asked to return to Australia by the Northern Territory police. Not once was I ever asked to return. Most of the dealings have been coming through the lawyer and he would have told me if I had been asked to return."

Lee said he did not run away from the accident or the legal implications.

"I stayed in Australia for almost a year after the accident. I didn't run from Australia after the accident," he said. "There was no indication they were going to lay any charges or anything until I returned to New Zealand.”