Biography
Irish republican supporter held at the Philadelphia Detention Center in connection with US federal charges arising from solidarity with the IRA. Documented in PFOC Breakthrough magazine.
James Gerard Barr was a member of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) and the Irish Republican Socialist Party (IRSP). Named by a supergrass informer, he fled to the United States, where the U.K. sought his extradition on an attempted-murder charge from Northern Ireland. He was held for some seventeen months at the Philadelphia Detention Center until a U.S. federal court denied the extradition request in 1985 for insufficient evidence — a rare such denial. He was later granted political asylum in the United States in 1993.
Formal extradition arrest distinguished from earlier detention
The FBI's original 1985 report, printed page 46 / physical page 52, explicitly records the FBI and INS arrest of James Gerard Barr in Philadelphia on December 12, 1984, in connection with the extradition request. The extradition row now uses that exact arrest date rather than May's month-only placeholder. This is not proof that his overall custody began in December: the existing May 1984 immigration-admission month is retained separately, pending further original-source review. An arrest under a later proceeding may occur after detention has begun. No additional prison stay is invented. Original FBI report.
The original August 25, 1985 opinion denies extradition for lack of probable cause; it does not establish physical release that day. The existing September 11 release remains unchanged. The two overlapping older records are preserved, not treated as proof of two independent terms. Their duration counters are approximate and should not be summed as separate time served. Exact initial immigration arrest/admission and an identifiable portrait remain unresolved. United States v. Barr, original opinion.
The September 28, 1985 Irish People reports that Immigration Judge Gossert granted Jim Barr bond on September 10 despite the government’s request for continued detention, and that he physically left Salem County Prison on September 11 after supporters raised the bond. The article distinguishes this immigration bond decision from Judge Newcomer’s August 25 refusal of the British extradition request. The September 11 endpoint is already correctly recorded; this report adds the final detention location and the one-day distinction between the bond order and actual release. No second independent prison term or exact original admission day is inferred.
