6 ms·

The general feeling was/is that the US is able to choose who they wish to extradite (or kidnap, depending on country) whenever they wish. However, when your own

The general feeling was/is that the US is able to choose who they wish to extradite (or kidnap, depending on country) whenever they wish. However, when your own nationals are being held, like Guantanamo Bay, you can't do anything about it. The Extradition Act of 2003 is one-sided: the US can request extradition for any UK national operating in the UK without evidence, while there is no such reciprocal agreement. The British legal system != the British government, and pretty much everyone hates that Act. It should never have been signed into law. Much of the McKinnon trial took place during the Bush years. British people were deeply uneasy that McKinnon wouldn't serve his sentence somewhere proportionate to the crime, but instead would be put in a maximum security prison and treated as a vicious terrorist in order to make a point.

tptacek 16y ago
This seems like a red herring on a bunch of different levels. First, the evidentiary standard for extradition under the new treaty isn't "on a whim". Prior to the treaty, the US was required to provide evidence sufficient to make an entire case for the offense, while the UK only had to provide probable cause --- in other words, it seems, the US had to make a criminal court case, and the UK only had to make a grand jury case. That's now changed; the US now needs to demonstrate "reasonable suspicion". Note that the UK apparently never had to provide "prima facie" evidence. The previous treaty was unfair, and more egregiously so, in exactly the opposite direction. It feels to me like that blunts your argument, like, a lot, but I'm listening. (There's an interesting Chatham House writeup that documents a debate as to whether perfect reciprocity even matters; many treaties aren't reciprocal, and what does it matter to citizens of the UK whether citizens of the US are harder to extradite? The terms for UK citizens are either reasonable or they aren't, independent of parity.) Second, extradition isn't the same thing as conviction. People are extradited to stand trial. Evidentiary standards are there so that another country can't harass your citizens with frivolous charges that create tremendous hardships (having to argue your innocense in a venue overseas). That's not what's happening here. Third, it's hard to argue that the evidentiary standards really matter in this case, since McKinnon has already asserted more than enough details publicly for the US to make a case. The evidentiary standards of the new treaty aren't the point. So I'm back to my original point, which is that the arguments in favor of not extraditing McKinnon seem to boil down to "the US legal system simply isn't trustworthy". That's what they're saying when they claim McKinnon is headed straight for Gitmo. It's a smokescreen. If you believe that about the US legal system, you shouldn't be extraditing anyone; we're running kangaroo courts, after all.
- DougBTX 16y ago
  If you believe that about the US legal system, you shouldn't be extraditing anyone; we're running kangaroo courts, after all. That would be my preference. Especially since the kangaroo courts may well be CIA flights to Afghanistan.
  - tptacek 16y ago
    With all due respect, because I have no doubt you're actually a totally reasonable and thoughtful person --- my default assumption about people with track records on HN --- but it seems to me like you're wearing a tinfoil hat on this issue. Like many Americans I'm deeply uncomfortable with the way we handled the issue of foreign "combatants" in AfPak and Iraq. I'm unhappy that Obama didn't simply close Gitmo and force us to suck up the pain and chaos that would have caused the rest of the country; we earned that pain fair and square. However, I understand these issues in context: to wit, (a) our war in Afghanistan, which while ineptly prosecuted was not prima facie illegitimate, put us in a position where neither military nor civilian law nor the resources we were prepared to field in theater were adequate to the task of handling the prisoners we generated, and (b) the widespread belief inside the government that specific named agents of known terrorist networks could be captured and turned to prevent future attacks. Both are bad. Both are wrong. But they're specific circumstances, and utterly unlike the circumstance faced by McKinnon. It's not as if there's no judicial record for what happens to people who hack our unbelievably wildly insecure DOD networks. Hint: not black sites.
    - jules 16y ago
      What is the track record then? On the one hand you seem to argue that the US justice system is sane, but on the other hand the US operates a prison that's one of the worst ever in existence (I for one would pick a death penalty over being tortured in said prison), and the justice system has not done anything about it. Why isn't the UK extraditing the operators of said prison for torturing UK citizens? (or are they?)
      - tptacek 16y ago

tptacek 16y ago

This seems like a red herring on a bunch of different levels. First, the evidentiary standard for extradition under the new treaty isn't "on a whim". Prior to the treaty, the US was required to provide evidence sufficient to make an entire case for the offense, while the UK only had to provide probable cause --- in other words, it seems, the US had to make a criminal court case, and the UK only had to make a grand jury case. That's now changed; the US now needs to demonstrate "reasonable suspicion". Note that the UK apparently never had to provide "prima facie" evidence. The previous treaty was unfair, and more egregiously so, in exactly the opposite direction. It feels to me like that blunts your argument, like, a lot, but I'm listening. (There's an interesting Chatham House writeup that documents a debate as to whether perfect reciprocity even matters; many treaties aren't reciprocal, and what does it matter to citizens of the UK whether citizens of the US are harder to extradite? The terms for UK citizens are either reasonable or they aren't, independent of parity.) Second, extradition isn't the same thing as conviction. People are extradited to stand trial. Evidentiary standards are there so that another country can't harass your citizens with frivolous charges that create tremendous hardships (having to argue your innocense in a venue overseas). That's not what's happening here. Third, it's hard to argue that the evidentiary standards really matter in this case, since McKinnon has already asserted more than enough details publicly for the US to make a case. The evidentiary standards of the new treaty aren't the point. So I'm back to my original point, which is that the arguments in favor of not extraditing McKinnon seem to boil down to "the US legal system simply isn't trustworthy". That's what they're saying when they claim McKinnon is headed straight for Gitmo. It's a smokescreen. If you believe that about the US legal system, you shouldn't be extraditing anyone; we're running kangaroo courts, after all.

DougBTX 16y ago
If you believe that about the US legal system, you shouldn't be extraditing anyone; we're running kangaroo courts, after all. That would be my preference. Especially since the kangaroo courts may well be CIA flights to Afghanistan.
- tptacek 16y ago
  With all due respect, because I have no doubt you're actually a totally reasonable and thoughtful person --- my default assumption about people with track records on HN --- but it seems to me like you're wearing a tinfoil hat on this issue. Like many Americans I'm deeply uncomfortable with the way we handled the issue of foreign "combatants" in AfPak and Iraq. I'm unhappy that Obama didn't simply close Gitmo and force us to suck up the pain and chaos that would have caused the rest of the country; we earned that pain fair and square. However, I understand these issues in context: to wit, (a) our war in Afghanistan, which while ineptly prosecuted was not prima facie illegitimate, put us in a position where neither military nor civilian law nor the resources we were prepared to field in theater were adequate to the task of handling the prisoners we generated, and (b) the widespread belief inside the government that specific named agents of known terrorist networks could be captured and turned to prevent future attacks. Both are bad. Both are wrong. But they're specific circumstances, and utterly unlike the circumstance faced by McKinnon. It's not as if there's no judicial record for what happens to people who hack our unbelievably wildly insecure DOD networks. Hint: not black sites.
  - jules 16y ago
    What is the track record then? On the one hand you seem to argue that the US justice system is sane, but on the other hand the US operates a prison that's one of the worst ever in existence (I for one would pick a death penalty over being tortured in said prison), and the justice system has not done anything about it. Why isn't the UK extraditing the operators of said prison for torturing UK citizens? (or are they?)
    - tptacek 16y ago