The Royal Canadian Mounted Police say they’re now trying to get the video off a memory card that was allegedly swallowed by a hang gliding pilot after his tandem passenger fell from the aircraft to her death a week ago. William Jon Orders was kept in jail until police had their hands on card, which they knew would emerge sooner or later because it showed up on a court-ordered X-ray. Orders was released on bail on Friday and the hearing heard what reporters said was “dramatic” evidence about the circumstances of the death of 27-year-old Lenami Godinez-Avila, a Mexican living in Vancouver. They couldn’t relate details of the evidence because the Canadian judicial system bans the publication of evidence entered in preliminary proceedings like bail hearings.
However, eyewitness accounts suggest Godinez-Avila’s harness was not attached to the frame of the hang glider when she slipped from Orders’ back, slid down his legs and then finally fell 1,000 feet to a recently logged section of forest on Mount Woodside, about 80 miles east of Vancouver. The police allege that Orders had a camera attached to the hang glider that would have recorded all or parts of the tragedy and that sometime after landing he took out the memory card and swallowed it. He will be back in court in Chilliwack, B.C., for a first appearance on the formal charge of obstruction. In most circumstances, any testimony heard at that stage would be public but Orders can request, and the judge can grant, another publication ban.
