Peter Howson backs campaign to stop hacker's extradition

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Peter Howson, one of Britain's most celebrated artists, will complete a series of portraits of Gary McKinnon this month, to highlight the case of the UFO enthusiast who faces ten years in a US jail after hacking into the American Army's computer network, causing it to crash...Like Howson, he has Asperger's syndrome, a form of autism that often makes it hard for sufferers to express themselves, causing some to focus their energy on one subject, to the exclusion of all others. It is often associated with people of higher than average intelligence: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/u ... 454618.ece

ONE of Scotland's most celebrated artists has joined the campaign to stop a Scottish man who hacked into Nasa's computer system from being extradited to the United States. Gary McKinnon, who suffers from Asperger's syndrome, a form of autism, faces up to 60 years in an American jail for accessing 97 US government computers in 2001 and 2002.
Now Peter Howson, who also suffers from Asperger's, has revealed a new painting and drawing of Mr McKinnon which he has created to highlight his plight: http://news.scotsman.com/latestnews/Pet ... 4842317.jp

He hacked into an allied government's military computers. Do you honestly expect him to get off on a technicality? He's lucky he's only getting 10 years.

The bottom line is if we truly want equal treatment, we must also expect the same punishments an NT would receive.

As for UFOs, I don't think the US government is covering up the existence of UFOs. They probably have concluded that if these unexplained sightings are indeed alien spacecraft, they are clearly here just for observational reasons and are not a threat to our security (or we'd already be dead). Thereforth the government should deal with (comparatively) more mundane matters rather then wasting time and money with something we aren't even sure exists.

He should be tried in England if at all.The Americans would not hand over one of theirs if one hacked our Military.Around 130000 prisoners are raped in US prisons every year-Gary isnt in the Aryan Brotherhood or the Hells Angels so he would have little chance of surviving intact.

Haha, up to 60 years, that’s insane.

I do however think he should be tried in England, it’s not like he killed someone..... Although he should probably be given a big wage as he could be quite useful for developing security systems/and finding holes in software.

Also, if America was withholding UFO evidence (I doubt it since if they could travel here there is little chance we could track them) I’m pretty sure it would be breaching their freedom of information act.

--lee

Hear! Hear!

If you're gonna do the crime, expect to do the time!

He knew what he was doing, and he knew that it was wrong. There are no mitigating circumstances. 10 years in prison for attacking an ally's military is sufficient.

I have been reseraching autism and Asperger's for three years now, since I first suspected I had it, and I have not found anything to suggest that an inability to distinguish right from wrong is an aspect of it.

I agree with The Cucumber, he should not be treated and differently from an NT that did that.

Yet again people miss the point.. the AS may only be a mild mitigation against what he is supposed to have done, but it is a huge and hefty reason for his punishment to be considered very carefully, lest it become cruel and unusual. The punishments suggested are cruel and unusual for an NT, never mind an Aspie.

Secondly: attacks? Or merely looking in places he shouldn't? There is a world of difference between the deliberate and fore-planned destruction of a military network, and poking about in some files....

Thirdly: American justice is widely considered to be a travesty over here, especially when it comes to "terrorism" and suchlike. Can the American government guarantee the safety and fair trial by a jury of his peers of this man? No they cannot.

Finally: I love how fast we are willing to hang our own.

Guilty. It is the only question.

We have a list of States that harbor terrorists, it is based on equal justice under law.

Accessing 97 secure computers, crashing the Army computer system, spying over two years is not accident.

He seems to "Suffer" from working for some intelligence group.

It is becoming clear, Britian was running a spy operation on America.

The American Army has nothing to do with Aliens, that is a Diplomatic relationship through the State Department.