McKinnon is obviously an extremely clever hacker, but also seems an ultimately harmless nerd, driven by an obssession to expose the records of UFO sightings that had been hushed up by the authorities.
He faces the threat of imminent fast-track extradition to the US for trial because of one of Blunkett's boobs, which led to the 2003 Extradition Treaty, which was signed in secret without a debate in Parliament. Had it come before the House of Lords (if not the Commons) almost certainly it would have been thrown out, or at least their Lordships would have demanded a reciprocal arrangement - which would have been refected by the US Congress and Senate.
McKinnon was recently diagnosed as suffereing from Asperger's syndrome, and the demonstration outside the US Embassy in London on Sunday afternoon, which was attended by around 50 demonstrators, was organised by the London Autistic Rights Movement. Autism experts say that his offence is a direct result of his obsession and that it shows no malicious intent whatsoever.
His supporters are urging Jacqui Smith to intervene on compassionate grounds and that he be allowed to stand trial in the UK rather than be extradited. McKinnon is now 42, and a US trial, according to a BBC report, could result in a jail sentence of over 45 years.
More about the case at http://freegary.org.uk and more pictures from the event on My London Diary http://mylondondiary.co.uk shortly.
Comments
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Hatch a plot for Blunkett
29.09.2008 19:06
That incompetent has a finger on the nuclear war trigger. Would we be better off with a woman in that position who is proud to be as vicious as a Pit Bull Terrier?
Should Britain deport Blunkett?
Ilyan
but the court has no final decision
09.10.2009 19:46
It can also be used for folks in even more danget than Gary: for dubious death row prisoners in America, and here for asylum seekers subjected to intentionally biased rejections. What they afre violated by in the end, and what Gary is suffering from now, is a final decision. Yet for 10 years already, and in both countries, final decisions have been abolished. I term this "THE COURT CHANGE".
Its shifting of power in favour of ordinary people ensures that it has been under a media silence, yet it is on publicly traceable record through petitions 730/99 in the European, PE6 and PE360 in the Scottish, parliaments. Since 7 July 1999 all court or other legal decisions are open-endedly faultable on their logic, instead of final. "Open to open-ended fault finding by any party".
This follows from my European Court of Human Rights case 41597/98 on a scandal of insurance policies requiring evictions of unemployed people from hotels. This case referred to violation of civil status from 13 May 1997, yet the admissibility decision claimed the last stage of decision taken within Britain was on 4 Aug 1995. ECHR has made itself illegal, by issuing a syntactically contradictory nonsense decision that reverses the physics of time, and calling it final. This violates every precedent that ECHR member countries' laws recognise the chronology of cause and effect, in court evidence.
Hence, the European Convention's section on requiring a court to exist requires its member countries to create an ECHR that removes the original's illegality, by its decisions not being final. It follows, this requires courts within the member countries to be compatible with open-ended decisions and with doing in-country work connected to them. Hence, legal decisions within the member countries' courts also cease to be final and become open-ended, in the 47 Council of Europe countries.
The concept of "leave to appeal" is abolished and judges no longer have to be crawled to as authority figures. Every party in a case is automatically entitled to lodge a fault finding against any decision, stating reasons. These are further faultable in return, including by the original fault finder, stating reasons. A case reaches its outcome when all fault findings have been answered or accepted.
World trade irreversibly means jurisdictions are not cocooned but have overlapping cases. When a case overlaps an affected and unaffected country, the unaffected country becomes affected, through having to deal with open ended case content open-endedly, that can affect any number of other cases open-endedly. Open-endedness is created in its system.
So the court change is of far-reaching international interest. Anyone can add to the list of court change countries outside the Council of Europe, showing autocracies, pending their freer futures, as well as democracies. Including the United States, through many cases including Gary's own, and I can offer one too.
Maurice Frank, Scotland.
Maurice Frank