The judge in an espionage case says the accused spy wants his case dealt with "as quickly as possible."

Federal Court Justice Pierre Blais said Wednesday he spoke to the accused, known as Paul William Hampel, in a teleconference call with lawyers last week.

However, defence lawyer Stephane Handfield says it's too soon to say if Hampel will or will not contest the national security certificate under which he was arrested at a Montreal airport last week.

Hampel appeared in court Wednesday in Montreal under heavy security, but the case was delayed until next Tuesday.

The capture of the suspected Russian spy has raised questions about how he was able to collect three successive passports using a fake birth certificate, despite the fact Canadian officials were supposed to crack down on lax passport procedures.

Court documents that were unsealed on Tuesday show Hampel managed to acquire three passports in seven years using a fake birth certificate. The accusations against him were included in a summary of evidence filed in Federal Court.

The summary, which was prepared by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, described Hampel as an "illegal" -- a high-level operative who allegedly spied in Canada and abroad on behalf of Russia's foreign-intelligence service, SVR.

Hampel claims to be a 40-year-old Toronto man who has been a lifeguard and travel consultant, and who has lived in Montreal since 1999.

He managed to get passports in 1995, 2000 and 2002.

In order to get the most recent passport, which he had been using until last week, Hampel filed an application in April of 2002 claiming he needed a passport within a week in order to travel. He used a 1999 driver's licence and a 1971 birth certificate as proof of his identity, and listed a guarantor whom he claimed had known him for eight years, The Globe and Mail reports.

The guarantor's name was not included in the document.

Canadian officials were supposed to tighten procedures for issuing passports after the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the 1999 arrest of terrorist Ahmed Ressam, a bomb-plotter who obtained a passport in Montreal using a forged baptismal certificate.

Auditor-General Sheila Fraser has since criticized the Passport Office on two occasions for failing to learn from its mistakes and enact adequate security checks.

"The Passport Office is struggling to meet increasing security expectations and demands for service," she said in a report last year. "There is no assurance that examiners have followed the required procedures to determine that an applicant is eligible for a passport."

Inquiries made to the Passport Office are being referred to the office of Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day. However, Day is refusing to comment on the proceedings while the case is before the courts.

Who's paying the lawyer?

Peter Marwitz, a former CSIS and RCMP intelligence officer told CTV Newsnet he believes the lawyer representing Hampel will provide clues to his true identity.

"It would appear the lawyer who is taking an interest in this case has probably already been assigned by Moscow," Marwitz told CTV Newsnet.

"I would suggest he ought to be inquired into by the media as to what his connection is to the Russian consulate, the Russian embassy, or to Moscow itself, because someone has to be paying the bills, that's for sure."

He suggested Russia has agents working all over the world, and said they should take responsibility for Hampel, if indeed he is a Russian spy.

"(Other agents are) going to be watching the outcome of this story and if this guy is left out to be hung and dried by Canada and left in prison to be exposed to CSIS and other inquirers about what he's about and what he's been doing, that's the last thing they want," Marwitz said.

"So they have to protect them and they're going to have to come through that lawyer or another lawyer and say this is our guy, let's make a deal."

At the time of his arrest, Hampel was carrying the fraudulent Ontario birth certificate, a Canadian passport, $7,800 in five different currencies and several bank and credit cards, and index cards with detailed notes about Canadian history. He also had three cellphones capable of use in different countries, two digital cameras and a shortwave radio.