Crown prosecutors at the Air India trial have defended an RCMP payment made to the trial's most controversial witness.

The court has learned that the Mounties paid the U.S. resident nearly $500,000 to testify against Ajaib Singh Bagri, one of the co-accused in the case.

On Tuesday, the Crown compared the payment with the plea bargain done in another notorious Canadian murder trial. Prosecutor Richard Cairns told the court the RCMP was justified in paying $460,000 to the witness called "John," whose real name is protected by court order.

Malik and Bagri

The court heard that John demanded the money to protect himself and his family from retaliation for testifying against Bagri.

Cairns said the evidence John provided the court was "priceless." He characterized the witness as a "good man" who deserved the money because he put himself in danger by testifying.

During his testimony, John told the court Bagri admitted his involvement in the 1985 Air India bombing plot.

Cairns compared John's payment with the plea bargain deal given to Karla Homolka in the Paul Bernardo murder case in Ontario in the mid-1990s.

Homolka was allowed to plead guilty to two counts of manslaughter in exchange for her testimony against Bernardo. She received a 12 year prison term and will be released next year.

Cairns said Homolka received a much better deal than the Air India witness.

He told the court that Homolka will soon be set free and that's a benefit worth a lot more than the money John received. Cairns said the payment to John hurts no one.

Defence lawyers contend John fabricated the story about Bagri to get the money.

Bagri and another man, Ripudaman Singh Malik, are charged with killing 331 people in two separate bombings on the same day in June 1985. One bomb killed 329 people on board Air India Flight 182, most of them Canadians. It was the worst mass murder in Canadian history.

The second bomb killed two baggage handlers at Tokyo's Narita Airport.

The trial continues.