pakled wrote:
...If two nations have extradition treaties with each other, the each can require the other to produce anyone who has committed a crime against them. I presume that the UK and US have such a treaty. ...
The problem is that at the time the alleged offences were committed, there was a treaty in force that required the US to provide proof of allegations.
That treaty was subsequently replaced with a different one *after* the alleged offences were committed. And the *new* treaty between the US and the UK does not require the US authorities to provide any evidence to support their allegations. They just have to say there are allegations. And they don't have to provide any proof of damage, although they have conveniently come up with (made up?) amounts for damage which neatly coincide with a threshold for charges or prosecution or some other neat technicality. Gary McKinnon has previously admitted accessing some of their systems, but he has always denied doing any damage.
Also, it's my understanding that he made those admissions while being questioned by British police officers, who interviewed him without a lawyer present, and while they were threatening to return to his girlfriend's house and pick up/arrest his girlfriend's teenage cousin, unless he 'cooperated' with them. He basically 'confessed' while under duress, which in many courts and legal systems would make such 'evidence' tainted and therefore inadmissable.
And the extradition treaty, which was signed after the alleged offences were committed was applied retroactively. So at the time the alleged offences were alleged committed the treaty was not in force and he could not have been extradited. It was only because they changed the law to make it possible.
There's that saying there's no point closing the stable door after the horse has bolted. But that's exactly what they did and are doing, in legal terms. And it's not even like they simply rounded up and dragged the horse back to the stable and locked it up. What they did in terms of making the extradition treaty retroactive is to turn back the clock to before the horse had bolted. What they've done is to say, hey, horse, we know that stable door was open and you walked through it. But we're turning the clocks back and closing the door so that we can really punish you and throw the book at you for walking through it when you did.
And also the extradition treaty is one-sided and not reciprocal, so basically, the US can say to the UK, hey, hand over your horses because we're telling you they did something wrong, we're not giving you any proof, any evidence that they've done something wrong, you've just got to hand over your horses. And if any of our American horses ever do anything wrong, you can't have them, we're not handing them over to you.
This case is just *wrong* on so many levels. Extracting a 'confession' through coercion, changing the law to make the extradition treaty retroactive, the UK signing up to a one-sided treaty that isn't reciprocal on both parties, the UK signing up to a treaty that doesn't require the US to who any proof or evidence to support their allegations, the US making up random amounts for 'damages' that neatly allow the case to be pursued, the determination on the part of the US to make out that some stoned UFO-hunter who walked into non-protected systems without passwords and firewalls, is somehow public enemy number 1 cyber-terrorist - when in actual fact, he was *stoned* he was *looking for proof of UFOs* he was doing it *using a dial-up connection from his girlfriend's bedroom, not using terribly sophisticated techniques* and he *let the US authorities know their security sucked, so they should just be thankful it was a stoned UFO-hunting geek who was in their systems, and not a 'real' terrorist*.
08 Dec 2008, 12:33 am
Seriously dude, think before you speak, and maybe get yourself a bit better informed and educated.
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