http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/10/13/mckinnon_extradition_latest/



By John Leyden

The Register

13th October 2008



The Home Secretary has rejected a request to rip up an extradition order 

against accused Pentagon hacker Gary McKinnon.



McKinnon was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome and solicitors for the 

Briton wrote to Jacqui Smith saying his medical condition ought to mean 

he should face criminal prosecution over his admitted hacking activities 

in the UK rather than the US. The 42 year-old London-based Scot faces 

seven charges of hacking into 97 US government, NASA and military 

systems during 2001 and 2002. He has described the acts as an attempt to 

unearth proof that the US military was suppressing evidence that it had 

acquired advanced technology from UFOs.



US prosecutors have been seeking his extradition for mounting the 

"biggest military hack of all time" since 2005 while the former sysadmin 

has run a high-profile campaign to avoid extradition. McKinnon's appeals 

against extradition were taken all the way through the British legal 

system to the House of Lords, where arguments were rejected that US 

authorities overstepped the mark in plea bargaining negotiations. The 

European Court of Human Rights declined to get involved, leaving a plea 

to the Home Secretary on medical grounds as McKinnon's main hope of 

avoiding a one-way trans-Atlantic trip with the US Marshalls' Service.



A brace of protests by McKinnon's supporters outside the Home Office and 

one outside the US Embassy have failed to achieve the required effect 

after Jacqui Smith declined to intervene, in a decision relayed to 

McKinnon's lawyers on Monday. Worse still, she failed to do anything to 

ensure McKinnon's early repatriation to the UK to serve the remainder of 

any sentence the US court might eventually impose.



[...]





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Received on Tue Oct 14 2008 - 22:23:04 PDT