US immigration service says Gibbons not an American -to determine his nationality in 48 hours Stabroek News February 4, 2000 The United States Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) expects to be able to determine the nationality of Edgar Garfield Gibbons in another 48 hours. Speaking with Stabroek News from the Houston, Texas regional office of the INS, Public Affairs Officer, Louise Aquino, said that her department was convinced that Gibbons was not an American. However, she said, the INS was working with other agencies to determine his nationality, adding that the information he had provided did not check out. The US Embassy yesterday announced that while it did not know who Gibbons was it did "know he is not who he purports to be. "The consular section of the Embassy will be shortly sending this gentleman a letter officially informing him that he cannot be documented as a US citizen based on the information he gave us under oath." Aquino also said that when Gibbons' nationality was determined he would not be transported back to the United States. She said that the US and Guyana governments would collaborate in sending him back to the country of his origin. Calling the Gibbons case a rare one, Aquino said that extensive checks would have been made by the US authorities to determine his country of origin during the 66 days he was in the custody of the INS. This included a hearing before an Immigration Court. The INS spokesperson said that Gibbons was determined to be a Guyanese based on the information obtained when he entered the prison and supplemented by what he himself had provided. She could not say if the information provided by the prison where he served his sentence indicated that he was a Guyanese. She said too that Gibbons had first indicated that he wanted to be sent to Belize but that after the government there refused to accept him, he requested to be sent to Guyana. Aquino noted that the Guyana Consulate in New York had issued a travel document based on the information submitted to it, as justification that he was a Guyanese. However, it was pointed out that the document was issued without any consular official having an opportunity to interview Gibbons to determine if he was indeed Guyanese. Aquino said too that the photographs with the documents sent to the Embassy here recently, would have been those taken of Gibbons and not those submitted for processing for an immigrant visa by Edgar Garfield Gibbons who migrated to the US from Guyana in 1978. She could not say whether any attempt was made to compare those prints with the photograph submitted by the Guyanese Gibbons who migrated to the US and is now resident in New Jersey. Meanwhile, Stabroek News learnt in a telephone interview with Gibbons yesterday, that his fingerprints were taken and handed over to a US Embassy official. Gibbons still maintains that he is an American even though details of his birth and the schools he attended cannot be verified according to the INS.