A rape suspect fighting extradition to the US has been given seven days by a court to lodge documents proving his claimed identity is real.
Nicholas Rossi, who fled to Scotland from America to escape an array of alleged offences, maintains he is actually a man called Arthur Knight.
Rossi, 34, failed to appear at his extradition hearing at Edinburgh Sheriff Court on Thursday with his wife claiming he has covid.
An ambulance took Rossi away from his Glasgow address in the hours before the case called.
It emerged during the hearing that Rossi has refused to provide DNA and fingerprints samples to the Crown.
The court also heard Rossi possessed an “Irish driver’s licence” under the name Arthur Knight but authorities there confirmed it wasn’t “legitimately issued”.
In his absence, Sheriff Kenneth Maciver ordered Rossi to bring a passport, birth certificate or other documents to the next hearing in one week’s time.
Fiscal depute Julie Clark said the Crown would make a motion for a warrant for Rossi’s arrest if he failed to appear in court next Thursday.
Rossi, who is accused of faking his own death in the US, was arrested at Glasgow’s Queen Elizabeth University Hospital last December while receiving treatment for Covid-19.
Ms Clark said Rossi’s wife, Miranda Knight, had contacted her office to say her husband “had tested positive for covid last week”.
Asked about the veracity of the allegation by Sheriff Maciver, the prosecutor said Ms Knight was the “only source”.
Ms Clark said an independent medical report on Rossi’s health had been ordered by a sheriff after he failed to appear at a court hearing on Monday. She added that report would be ready next Thursday.
The court heard police officers were at Rossi’s home on Wednesday night to carry out a daily bail check and found an ambulance was in attendance. Ms Clark said Rossi declined to get in the ambulance and the cops had “no concerns” about Rossi’s health.
She said Ms Knight informed the Crown that an ambulance returned on Thursday morning and Rossi was taken to hospital.
Sheriff Maciver said he’d received “hourly emails” with reports on Rossi’s condition, which included an “ECG”, but “very little facts”.
Ms Clark confirmed the Crown had no way of verifying if Rossi has covid.
She said Rossi had been treated at Glasgow’s Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in December and showed signs of “suffering from long covid”.
Ms Clark said that included apparent damage to his lungs and the need for some “oxygen therapy”, but all other health information “comes from either him or his wife”.
She said she understood Rossi had “refused permission” for doctors to access his medical records so any assessments “are tainted”.
Ms Clark said the Crown had a petition to request Rossi supply DNA and fingerprint samples as he refused to provide them “voluntarily” when police called at his home to ask.
Sheriff Maciver said: “It seems to be obvious that the first thing that needs to happen is that we need to know who this man is.
“We can’t waste huge amounts of court time if we don’t know who he is.”
Ms Clark said that was “extremely difficult to establish” due to Rossi’s refusal to provide samples.
She added: “Mr Rossi says he’s never been to America.”
Asked by the sheriff if Rossi had offered any proof he was Arthur Knight, Ms Clark said the accused had an Irish driving licence in that name, adding: “The Irish authorities had no record of that being legitimately provided”.
Prosecutor had spoken to a GP in England, she said, who had shown a passport by Rossi when he tried to enrol with the practice, but he refused to allow the doctor to photocopy it.
Ms Clark said Rossi has used the name Arthur Knight in the UK, taking the name of his wife following their marriage, along with “four or five” other aliases.
Sheriff Maciver imposed an order requiring Rossi to bring documents to court “to demonstrate he is Arthur Knight” at the next hearing.
The sheriff said the petition for DNA and fingerprints would be considered at that time.
Ms Clark said Rossi has had “three solicitors” that the Crown knew of, and had recently contacted them to claim he was close to hiring another one.
US prosecutors claim Rossi raped a 21-year-old in Utah, in 2008. He is also said to have attacked women in Rhode Island, Ohio and Massachusetts. They say he has previously used the names Nick Alan, Nicholas Brown, Arthur Brown and Arthur Knight.
He was arrested at Glasgow’s Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in December after medical staff were shown pictures of him.
Rossi reportedly told US media in December 2019 that he had late-stage non-Hodgkin lymphoma and had weeks to live. Several outlets reported that he had died in February 2020.
