extradition without evidence-uncle sam wants you!

Pierre · 24-02-2006, 09:18

I don't believe anyone has picked this one up.

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/leg...icle346840.ece

This guys have broken no law in America,

They went to the FSA volunterily and advised that they had had dealing associated with enron and asked for advice.

The USA are trying to extradite them on an anti-terrorism agreement brought in to speed up the transfer of terrorist suspects.

The USA offer no evidence, and supposedly need none either, under this agreement their accusation is enough to ship these guys to the USA.

The fraud squad/FSA are not investigating these guys and have no case against them.

This is very worrying. Again as in the case of the old giffer in the labour party conference - so called anti-terrorism laws are being used against ordinary members of the public.

It's started, it's happening now - be worried, be very worried about your rights and your civil liberties. as this government is determined to take them away from you

eddie00001 · 24-02-2006, 10:00

Remeber reading something about this some time ago, and the agreement is only one way. The UK is unable to do the same for a person in the USA - typical!

punky · 24-02-2006, 10:01

Eh?

Two UK justices, including a lord justice for the appeals court, have ruled that the extradition should happen. What's the point in having our own judicial system if you are going to dismiss it everytime a judge rules against your opinion?

Quote:

He said the facts disclosed "a significant United States dimension to the whole case.

Doesn't sound like no evidence to me...

The extradition treaty was revised shortly after sept. 11th 2001. Does that mean everyone extradited until the law revised is terror related? Of course not.

And about this whole "surrendering our justice system to the Americans"... What country surrenders anything? Its all give and take. If we tilted the extradition in favour of the Americans, you can bet we got something just as good in return. Even if its exactly how you say, its not shame on the US for doing it, its shame on poxy Labour for being mug enough to accept it.

eddie00001 · 24-02-2006, 10:07

This is what I can't understand - why we agreed to a treaty where we don't get an equal deal, really does seem like we've surrendered our justice system to the USA

Quote:

A key change is that certain countries, including the US, no longer have to produce prime facie evidence - proof that there is a case to answer - in order to have a suspect extradited from the UK. By contrast, US citizens cannot yet be extradited to Britain in a similar way.

punky · 24-02-2006, 10:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by eddie00001

A key change is that certain countries, including the US, no longer have to produce prime facie evidence

Noone mentions these other countries though. Which ones are they?

And history/FOIA act has shown that so much jiggery-pokery goes on behind the scenes that just because we don't know what's going on, doesn't mean nothing is.

eddie00001 · 24-02-2006, 10:29

More about the Extradition Act 2003 here http://www.2gardenct.law.co.uk/index...ition_act_2003

Most of the country the Act applies to, appear to be EU member states

punky · 24-02-2006, 10:36

Uh

Quote:

Exceptions from prima facie case
There is no requirement to show a prima
facie case for these category 2 territories
(s 84 (7), Sch in Art 3, EA 2003, Designation
of Part 2 Territories) Order SI
2003/3334:
Albania, Andorra, Armenia, Australia,
Austria, Azerbijan, Bulgaria, Canada,
Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia,
France, Georgia, Germany, Greece,
Hungary, Iceland, Israel, Italy, Latvia,
Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxemburg,
Macedonia, FYR, Malta, Moldova,
Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway,
Poland, Romania, Russian Federation,
Serbia and Montenegro, Slovakia, Slovenia,
South Africa, Switzerland, Turkey,
Ukraine, USA.

Bloody hell. But I suppose all those countries being exempt from a prima facie case still is the fault of the Americans. Its not their fault by using it, its our fault for setting it up in the first place.

eddie00001 · 24-02-2006, 11:44

There's a lot of countries on that list I'd never want to have to go on trial in!

punky · 24-02-2006, 11:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by eddie00001

There's a lot of countries on that list I'd never want to have to go on trial in!

You aren't the only one dude.

Never knew anything about this, everyone only mentions the US.

basa · 24-02-2006, 12:04

What with this and BBK's threads does anyone still wonder why I'm planning to get out of this god forsaken hole a.s.a.p.

They're wrecking this country.

24-02-2006, 12:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by basa

What with this and BBK's threads does anyone still wonder why I'm planning to get out of this god forsaken hole a.s.a.p.

They're wrecking this country.

This is what you get with Bush's poodle is in charge of the country.

BBKing · 24-02-2006, 19:41

Quote:

Never knew anything about this, everyone only mentions the US.

They're virtually all Council of Europe members, where we at least share some legal background (yes, even places like Ukraine) via the European Court of Human Rights, which is the ultimate court of appeal whether you're tried over here or over there, and provides guarantees of a fair trial in your own language and other safeguards. New Zealand, Australia, South Africa and the USA would be the exceptions, and three of them are Commonwealth. There isn't a language problem of course (unless you're extradited to Texas :P).

The European countries were already governed by similar treaties with us and there's a general EU-US treaty as well - notably it doesn't abolish the evidence requirement, even for US-friendly states like Italy or Denmark and those who've suffered terrorism like Spain.

EU countries also now have the European Arrest Warrant, which is what was used in the case of Hussein Osman - given the freedom of movement and labour in the EU this is fine by me, as you've got to allow the police similar freedom of movement. Doesn't apply to the US though.

The US-UK Treaty was actually brought in under the legislation for the EU Arrest Warrant, another example of slipping something into legislation about something else - another of the multitude of examples of this trick being pulled.

Quote:

If we tilted the extradition in favour of the Americans, you can bet we got something just as good in return

No we didn't, the US hasn't actually ratified their end of it. Were we, for instance, to say 'we believe this Irish chap planted a load of bombs in Northern Ireland then legged it to the USA' they wouldn't just hand him over - we'd have to provide reasonable proof of guilt. In the reverse case, we wouldn't be able to stop it once they'd proved they'd got the right man. It's not remotely balanced or fair - people in the US wanted for crimes here get more legal protection than people here wanted in the US. I'm not sure that's defensible - the Home Office people I've heard try blatantly lied.

The official line is that the US can't extradite its citizens willy nilly because they have a Constitution that prevents them doing this without good evidence. We don't have a Constitution, so rather than take a leaf out of their book, it's best for us that we can quite happily be trampled on.

The judges (actually it's usually one judge, by a quirk of fate, who gets to hear nearly all the extradition cases, a chap called Timothy Workman) can only rule on the basis of what the law is - the fact that the Treaty was brought in by Royal Prerogative (i.e. without the benefit of Parliament) is, unfortunately irrelevant (except that they can't pull that trick any more - it's got to go through Parliament now). If judges start making law you get a constitutional crisis just as much as if politicians start undermining judges (which brings us back to Blunkett again).

Anyway, here's a fairly sober assessment:

http://www.statewatch.org/news/2003/jul/25ukus.htm

BBKing · 10-03-2006, 16:45

Someone whom Uncle Sam wanted (and got) on the basis of no evidence turns out to be, er, innocent.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4792334.stm

What on earth do New Labour and the US Adminstration have against proper evidential procedures anyway? Guantanamo, Iraqi WMDs, control orders, rendition. Can't just be coincidence that they keep wanting to bypass justice, surely?

Xaccers · 10-03-2006, 16:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by BBKing

Someone whom Uncle Sam wanted (and got) on the basis of no evidence turns out to be, er, innocent.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4792334.stm

What on earth do New Labour and the US Adminstration have against proper evidential procedures anyway? Guantanamo, Iraqi WMDs, control orders, rendition. Can't just be coincidence that they keep wanting to bypass justice, surely?

Quote:

A Home Office spokesman said the US/UK extradition treaty brought benefits for Britain.

It meant crimes such as computer-related offences which were unknown when the last extradition treaty was signed were now covered.

"Our experience under the new arrangements has to date been extremely positive," said the spokesman.

"Requests from the US are now taking an average of six to 12 months to process compared to 30 months under the old arrangements.

"This is much closer to the time taken to process requests by the US - five months. This benefits victims, witnesses, our courts, and the fugitive themselves."

US requests are now handled in the precisely same way as used with other European countries since 1991 and with nations like Australia, New Zealand, Canada and South Africa, he added.

Yet again, rather than a thread about the other countries with dubious legal structures which don't require prima facie, we get an anti-american thread from BBKing

Next time BBKing, why not just come clean from the start and call your next thread "I want to bash the US for no particular reason"

BBKing · 10-03-2006, 17:55

Unless you're blind or ignorant and don't realise who he is, ask yourself why I'd have a picture and quotation from one of the Founding Fathers of the USA on my profile. Once you've explained how that fits into your erroneous image of me as a 'US Basher' you can rejoin the debate.