How a rural Ontario town helped free a Honduran human rights activist from prison
CBC
After surviving 19 months in a Honduran maximum security prison and a nearly four-year legal fight, "Elmvale's Edwin Espinal" is finally free.
Espinal, a Honduran human rights activist arrested and jailed during anti-government protests in his native country in January 2018, is featured on two billboards near the town in Simcoe County, about 120 kilometres north of Toronto. The signs — one erected on Highway 90 in 2018, the other on Highway 92 in 2019 — call him "Elmvale's Edwin Espinal" and implore drivers to "free political prisoners" and "stand up for human rights."
Though Espinal himself has never been to Canada, his wife, Karen Spring, grew up in Elmvale. Her mother, Janet Spring, launched the local campaign to free her son-in-law after he was arrested with hundreds of others who took to the streets, angry with the country's presidential election results, which they viewed as fraudulent.
Espinal was charged alongside another protester, Raul Alvares, whom he'd never met before, for allegedly damaging property and arson. If found guilty, they would have faced a minimum of 12 years in prison, according to Karen. But with no evidence, the National Territorial Jurisdiction Court absolved them both on Friday — a huge relief, she said.
Espinal was released on bail in August 2019 after 19 months in pre-trial custody where he said he wasn't allowed phone calls, pens or books, and was given little food.
"In Honduras there's well-documented corruption inside the judiciary," Karen told CBC News in a video call with her husband from the capital of Tegucigalpa where they live. "And so we were really worried that it was going to be another kangaroo court that would toe the line of the government."
Espinal says that what helped him and Alvares win was international pressure, stemming from Janet's campaigning in rural Ontario. Eventually, it led to elected officials in Canada advocating for his release.
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