Should we extradite our citizens to the USA?

[98elise]

For a proper crime commited on US soil, then yes.

For having links to copyright material on your website, no.

The current copyright case is mental, as far as I can see the bloke has not commited a crime. Using the logic of this case, anyone under 21 drinking in a UK pub could find themselves being extradited to the states.

[FeatherZ]

Driving with suspended sentence and put in with class A murderers, yeah well fair, beaten to near death on first day in the cell.

[uk66fastback]

98elise said:

For a proper crime commited on US soil, then yes.

For having links to copyright material on your website, no.

The current copyright case is mental, as far as I can see the bloke has not commited a crime. Using the logic of this case, anyone under 21 drinking in a UK pub could find themselves being extradited to the states.

Exactly this. If you're a UK citizen and you bludgeon someone to death in the US - like that bloke did his wife and child a few years back and then fled back over here - if the evidence is there then extradite (which they did in his case - and he was found guilty) ...

But the same rules should apply for US citizens over here - ie the extradition rules should be the bloody same! It's a scandal that they aren't anyway (thanks BLiar) and Cameron is nearly as bad for not getting them changed as soon as he came into office.

• Special relationship* blah blah - bks - does anyone really think the US Govt cares about anyone but itself?

[LukeBird]

Mojooo said:

Might find this interesting

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-16041824

Very interesting thanks.

[anonymous-user]

As long as the extradition terms are equally applied and respected by both nations.

[MartG]

If someone offends against a US law when physically located in the US, then yes. If someone offends against a US law whilst physically located in another country where the action is not illegal, then no.

[JagLover]

thehawk said:

If there is clear evidence that a crime has been committed on US soil and people are hiding from this in the UK then I have no problem with extradition.

This

The trouble with some contentious extraditions recently is that there hasn't been evidence that a crime has been committed on US soil.

[Halb]

Jackleman said:

I'm against it for a variety of reasons.

One thing that really got me recently was how barbaric the legal system is in the States, for a country that is supposed to lead the world they are actually pretty backwards when it comes to their legal system. They lock people up like animals for years at a time without trial in disgusting conditions.

For those that think I'm being unfair, perhaps watch this ...

Louis Theroux Miami Mega Jails...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Px2kTQKZaSU

That mega gaol thing was very scary. A world apart from where I (and I suppose most of us) are.

[Ozzie Osmond]

98elise said:

For a proper crime commited on US soil, then yes.

You mean like posting a parcel bomb from outside USA to an address in New York where it blows up and kills someone? Is that crime committed in USa or not?

How does that differ from operating a website available to US citizens through which they watch in USA copyright material which has been made in USA and is protected by US copyright?

[TheHeretic]

Ozzie Osmond said:

You mean like posting a parcel bomb from outside USA to an address in New York where it blows up and kills someone? Is that crime committed in USa or not?

How does that differ from operating a website available to US citizens through which they watch in USA copyright material which has been made in USA and is protected by US copyright?

Then the country the chap is in should act under its own copyright legislation.

[G600]

Ozzie Osmond said:

How does that differ from operating a website available to US citizens through which they watch in USA copyright material which has been made in USA and is protected by US copyright?

You can watch copyrighted material just as easily through google search but I don't see anyone at google being arrested, how can we extradite someone in a case like this?

[mrmr96]

Extraditions are OK in some circumstances. One of the conditions which I think should be in place is that or a reciprocal and equivalent arrangement. (like a mirror extradition policies mirror each way.)

There is not an equal reciprocal arrangement between the USA and the UK.
(I.e. there's circumstances which would lead to us sending a guy to them, but roles reversed they wouldn't send an equivalent guy to us, if that makes sense.)

[Oakey]

Ozzie Osmond said:

You mean like posting a parcel bomb from outside USA to an address in New York where it blows up and kills someone? Is that crime committed in USa or not?

How does that differ from operating a website available to US citizens through which they watch in USA copyright material which has been made in USA and is protected by US copyright?

One is an act of terrorism and the other is a questionable civil matter?

Your analogy would make more sense if your comparison had been a link on a site to the Anarchists Cookbook hosted elsewhere.

[98elise]

Ozzie Osmond said:

98elise said:

For a proper crime commited on US soil, then yes.

You mean like posting a parcel bomb from outside USA to an address in New York where it blows up and kills someone? Is that crime committed in USa or not?

How does that differ from operating a website available to US citizens through which they watch in USA copyright material which has been made in USA and is protected by US copyright?

The crime would have been comitted on US soil. If the person posted a bomb to another country do you think the US would be interested.

A website containing illegal content content in the US, but not the country of origin, does not mean the owner has committed a crime. The owner has no say in what countries the website can be seen, but govenment of that country do. There are many things that are illegal in one country, but not another.

[unrepentant]

fluffnik said:

greygoose said:

I believe the British government has said it would not extradite people to face the death penalty in any country so that option is taken off the table before extradition is applied for.

I don't think we should be sending citizens anywhere that has capital punishment ever.

I believe its EU law that no member state can extradite anyone if there is a danger to their life (i.e. they may be executed). I think that the extradition treaty therefore has a prerequisite condition that no extraditee (sic?) can face the death penalty.

[Ayahuasca]

The current situation is abominable. The latest case is that of a UK citizen who will be carted off to be tried in the USA for doing something in the UK that is not a crime in the UK.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/9013961...

This is analogous to the USA extraditing an 18 year old Londoner for buying a pint in a London pub because the legal drinking age in the USA is 21.

[marcosgt]

Where's the "only if there's a case to answer under UK law (and not some stupid legislation that only works one way)" option?

If there's a case to answer for theft or murder or assault or something, of course (and they should extradite to us too), but not because some autistic guy made the CIA look stupid by hacking their computers...

M

[johnfm]

How many Irish Americans in Boston are the UK going to extradite for funding IRA terrorism over the last few decades?

[Mojooo]

mrmr96 said:

Extraditions are OK in some circumstances. One of the conditions which I think should be in place is that or a reciprocal and equivalent arrangement. (like a mirror extradition policies mirror each way.)

There is not an equal reciprocal arrangement between the USA and the UK.
(I.e. there's circumstances which would lead to us sending a guy to them, but roles reversed they wouldn't send an equivalent guy to us, if that makes sense.)

Can you expand? The report on extradition last year suggests that athough the USA and UK ahve different legal systems and use different words the level of evidence needed to extract someone from the USA to the UK is largely the same as the other way.

We cannot have a 'mirror' agreement because their legal system is not the same as ours.

G600 said:

You can watch copyrighted material just as easily through google search but I don't see anyone at google being arrested, how can we extradite someone in a case like this?

Google may well be guilty of criminal offences in the USA - but that has nothing to do with this guys prosecution.

There are hundreds of cases of people in the UK being rpsecuted for soemthing whilst others get away with the same crime.

[fluffnik]

Mojooo said:

We cannot have a 'mirror' agreement because their legal system is not the same as ours.

So we should not extradite anyone at all...

The US legal system is every bit as sketchy and unjust and its prison system every bit as brutal as those of many places we won't deport to, we should not be sending our citizens there against their will, ever.