US will extradite Dickinson suspect murder suspect

The Spaniard accused of murdering the British schoolgirl Caroline Dickinson five years ago was told last night he would be extradited to stand trial in France.

Francisco Arce Montes will, though, not leave America until after his trial next month on unrelated sex charges and any appeal could last up to two years. A magistrate in Miami said he would sign a formal order next week clearing the way for his return in the first American extradition case based solely on DNA evidence.

The French DNA evidence showed a statistical match "way beyond total world population" that Mr Montes's saliva samples matched semen found at the youth hostel where Caroline, 13, was killed.

Judge Stephen Brown rejected challenges to the reliability of two French DNA reports but an appeal is expected. Mr Brown said: "I find a lot to suggest that there might be a defence. This is not the place for it to be raised."

A French court issued a 17-page international arrest warrant in April for Mr Montes, 51, of Gijon, northern Spain, accusing him of raping and suffocating the schoolgirl. Caroline, from Launceston, Cornwall, was staying in the Brittany village of Pleine-Fougeres on a school trip in July 1996 when she was attacked and killed.

Mr Montes, who has a rape conviction in Germany, had travelled to Argentina, Chile and Peru before flying to Miami in February where he was charged after breaking into a woman's room at a hostel in Miami Beach.

There cannot be an appeal on a magistrate's decision to extradite but a second legal avenue would allow the issue to be reviewed by other federal judges.