Gary McKinnon and extradition

The pic above is of Gary McKinnon, also known as Solo. He is a Scottish hacker and has been diagnosed as suffering from Aspergers Syndrome (by no less distinguished a person than Professor Simon Baron-Cohen (cousin of Brüno or whatever he is called in real life). Gary McKinnon - I suppose I have to say allegedly although there doesn't seem any dispute over what he did - hacked into 97 US military and NASA computers. He is evidently very good at this sort of thing. To get an idea of where he is coming from it is necessary to understand why he was applying himself so diligently to this hacking - he wanted to prove the existence of UFOs, antigravity technology and "the suppression of 'free energy'" (no I've never heard of this either - it's apparently some sort of conspiracy theory).

You get the flavour of the guy - The US government however, its dignity thus affronted, wants to extradite him as some sort of cyber terrorist. He was originally arrested in the UK under the Computer Misuse Act. The CPS declined to prosecute. The US government then went for extradition. The story is really how supine the British Government is in face of the US demands for his extradition. Under British hacking laws - and he contends that the oiffences were committed here - he could face up to 5 years in prison. The Americans want to make an example of him and he could receive a sentence in the US if extradited measured in decades.

And the response of British Home Secretaries? John Reid: approved the extradition with unsurprising alacrity. Jacqui Smith (if you'll pardon the expression) waved the extradition through without even seeking any guarantees as regards bail or return to the UK to complete his sentence. Alan Johnson reprises the Pontius Pilate gig, announcing that his hands are tied. Ther is a more general problem here. And there is a general problem as regards the Anglo-American Extradition Treaty. It is cock eyed in that there is not equality as regards safeguards. The issue of inequality as regards US/UK extradition came up before with what came to be known as the 'NatWest Three' (he typed struggling to work up any sympathy for bankers).

The problem goes broadly like this: The effect of the US/UK extradition treaty is that that UK citizens have fewer rights to due process of law than do American citizens. It centres around provisions in the treaty that require Britain to surrender its citizens on American request without the Americans providing a jot of evidence that they are guilty of anything. The treaty is not reciprocal. The UK must provide evidence of guilt before an American can be removed under the treaty.

What collection of snivelling sycophants agreed to such an unequal and fundamentally unfair treaty? New Fucking Labour, that's who! There have been Parliamentary challenges to the treaty. They have come to nothing. In the particular case of Gary McKinnon, the courts (including Europe) have been to no avail so far. Further comment seems superfluous. Perhaps it's time for us to declare independence and start by telling the US where they can put their extradition treaty.

Australia 649/5 at time of writing, Cruel and unusual punishment.