Free Gary McKinnon

the lyrics to pink floyd's 'us and them' seem rather fitting as well...

Could anyone get me a copy of - or knows where I can obtain access to the " radio play, The McKinnon Extradition, broadcast on BBC Radio 4 ", so that I may rebroadcast it here in Canada?

Has any other supporters of Gary experienced harrassment for their support? I did just 10 minutes ago in my home-town. When I'm not camping with my two dogs, I'm in my motel room up-dating my web-pages. This afternoon when I left my room to walk the dogs, a man who looked South Asian was washing his SUV a few rooms down from mine. He spent hours washing his car. Sometimes he was in his room with the door open. But, all afternoon he washed that SUV.

About 10 minutes ago, I got on the Internet and up-loaded my up-dated pages. Two of the 8 floppy disks that are numbered in sequence and in my shoulder bag were out of order. I always put them in order and I didn't drink today. The man went in my room during the one time today that I didn't bring my shoulder bag with me - when I went next door to take my laundry out of the dryer. The two disks that were out of order and at the back of the stack were the only two disks that contained copies of the web-pages that I had just up-dated.

I also noticed that the leash on one of my dog's collar was backwards when I put it on the dog for a walk.

I've read a lot of non-fiction books about spies and logic tells me that I when I was on my way back, the man had to quickly put the two floppy disks back in the box and in my shouldr bag. That means he had to have had a look-out to let him know that I was on my way back, so that he wouldn't be seen by me in my room.

Does anyone have the e-mail of that English lady TV host - Victoria - who trains dogs? Mine need to be a little less friendly.

Why do the Intelligence people play such silly games? It seems like ordinary people and their governments are on different sides. I understand GARY'S wonder at why his government and the U.S. government just didn't ask him what was going on?

I worry more about my dogs than I do about my web-pages, when government agents sneak around my home.

Has any other supporters of Gary experienced harrassment for their support?

Not that I have heard of, but it is a possibility, although why anyone would bother, is a mystery. In what way are you a threat to anyone ? Surely your other activities are much more potentially suspicious, than your support for Gary McKinnon's peaceful, legal, democratic campaign against unfair extradition to the USA, in favour of the rule of British law, British sovereignty and natural, proportionate, justice ?

There are a few people who have made threats of violence and libels against Gary (and some who have done so against "Americans" or "Brits" etc.), here on these blog comments and by email. In a fair and just world, they would be the people who would have their email and phone calls monitored by law enforcement and intelligence agencies, but such bureaucracies are not usually that proactive. Covert surveillance requires teams of several people, round the clock, and that costs a lot of money.

Having said that, however, Gary's supporters, and the journalists who write or broadcast about the case, should all take a few basic precautions e.g. see the links at http://ht4w.co.uk

That means he had to have had a look-out to let him know that I was on my way back, so that he wouldn't be seen by me in my room.

If he was "washing his SUV" i.e. with wet hands, wet shoes etc. it would have been more logical for him to have been the "look-out", or, more likely, to have been completely innocent.

Surely sneak thieves are much more common than incompetent government surveillance teams, tipping off the victims of their snooping to their presence ?

Does anyone have the e-mail of that English lady TV host - Victoria - who trains dogs?

5 seconds with a search engine finds:

http://www.victoriastilwell.com/contact

However:

Due to the overwhelming number of emails she receives, Victoria is unable to respond to personal training question-related emails

I've certainly been harrased by authorities.

Back a few years ago I wasa high profile activist - my area was Human Rights and Poverty. Probably the greatest moment was when I had a document read at the Geneva Convention in '97 that had Canada loose a notch on the scale.

Also being a IT Security professional I had been asked to work for the US Cyberforce, I refused due to my anti war beliefs and ethical convictions.

One week latter I was beaten by the RCMP with a friend of mine who is a Baliff ! There was never any appology nor when I tried to press charges was I able to - there was no record of me being in the cells on video - it had been wipped - and my 'friend' refused to act as a witness.

That was just one example - I have been harrassed in many many many different ways - to much to go over here.

Hi,
Right one?

http://wikisend.com/download/461148/The_McK_Extrad_-_B-B-C_R_4.mp3
MD5: 09D7DBEE1C0E8519B6FC47AA00179DC6

It is well noted on television by Gary McKinnon that the processes he went through on his computer to conceal his work and achieve his goals were very complex.

All of that tells me he was in control and fully aware of his actions to the smallest detail.

I have been told I have higher functioning autistic spectrum disorder and I am told also that I have Aspergers syndrome.

I know that all of what Gary McKinnon has done is wrong without doing it.

I can also tell you that if he acted of his own volition he knew even more that it was wrong.

Back to my alleged ASD, I cannot do even half of what Gary McKinnon did with my own computer.

So all of that should tell you that Gary knew all of what he did including the wrong.

Yesterday, I was looking through server response codes, "headers" as we geeks call them, trying to see if there was anything that I had missed. Actually, I was looking for something but never found it.

RFC 2058
http://www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc2068/rfc2068

When I got to the section 10.4.2 401 Unauthorized I realized something that was so obvious but eluded me up till now. That is - is - unauthorized access coughs back a 401 response code, you can only get that if you did something the server saw as unauthorized access.

In Gary McKinnons access to the US network - he never once got such a response code. Why? Because the access was NOT UNAUTHORIUZED ACCESS. It was authorized access !

Now, I know what you all are saying out there, well, if someone is in the system snooping around that is not suppost to be there, isn't that unauthorized? Technically, no, it is an 'authorized access' and the log files will prove it.

Elle Hart, Elec.Eng.Tech

You see, if an authorized access is made into a crime, then being that law evolves, not unlike human beings (hopefully) , then all of you out there who did an authorized access are criminals!

Access to government records - should be open to all citizens. Secondly, why not? It is too easily abused, when information is shrouded in secrecy. How do we know that nine one one wasn't staged by the military for money?

Who is the 'terrorist' then?

no trespassing signs do not appear on every fence or gate, but like most people we all live some where and have doors to these places and they mostly do not have no trespassing on them, yet we know not to trespass unless we are thieves or trespassers.

Gary admitted computer misuse on his dial up computer seven years ago when told by the U.K police he would get six months community service.

This should not be an extraditable offence and by trying to make it so, an ass is being made of U.K law.

Instead of using U,S and U.K resources to track down real terrorists and murderers they are spending millions of pounds on trying to extradite Gary McKinnon and making an ass of themselves in the process.

This is also making an ass of the one sided extradition treaty and has grossly undermined it, as it is being used friviously and irresponsibly by the American government.

End of Story

Well then, that confession was the result of coercion and a good legal team should see to it that it is not admissible as evidence.

And, there was no "unauthorized access" - no 401 code so -

RFC 1087 does not apply:
http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1087
The IAB strongly endorses the view of the Division Advisory Panel of the National Science Foundation Division of Network, Communications Research and Infrastructure which, in paraphrase, characterized as unethical and unacceptable any activity which purposely:
(a) seeks to gain unauthorized access to the resources of the Internet,

Elle

he knew what he did, even if it was entrapment.

well entrapment is legal here also much to my and others disgust.

the upper working classes middle and upper classes voted it in to protect thier property.

Gary knew that it was computer misuse and that it then (7 years ago)would have attracted a six months comminity service sentence and was not an extraditable offence and that's the point.

This should not be an extraditable offence and by trying to make it so, an ass is being made of U.K law.

Instead of using U,S and U.K resources to track down real terrorists and murderers they are spending millions of pounds on trying to extradite Gary McKinnon and making an ass of themselves in the process.

This is also making an ass of the alreadyone sided extradition treaty and has grossly undermined it, as it is being used friviously and irresponsibly by the American government.

End of Story

i'm from canada and just became aware of this situation as i was at a pink floyd website.

having a mental disorder does not mean a person should be excused from commiting a crime.
he knew what he was doing, and he was intentionally using his hacking to get into US restricted sites. although the crime wasn't technically commited on US soil, the content of those websites and files he hacked were property of the US government.
he brags about what he did, talking about the mistakes he made that lead to him being caught. of course we have the right to protest things we don't agree with, but there are legal ways of doing this. if mr mckinnon would have been a terrorist there would be no question about what should be done. justice needs to be blind. we can not pick and choose which laws should be followed based on skin color or religious beliefs.
i do not support the US supposed war on terror. i think it is really a war about oil. i do not agree that my fellow canadians are fighting and dying in afganistan to stop the US's number one enemy while the US has more or less left and moved on to different targets. however, countries need to take all threats to themselves seriously, and while mr. mikinnon seems to act like this is a big joke what he did was very serious. for all the US knew mr. mickinnon was employed by al quada, or a member of a terrorist cell himself. he should be taken to the US to have a trial.
i wonder if the reverse had happened and a US citizen hacked into high ranking UK sites if many of you people here would feel the same about them as you do about mr. mikinnon.
if mr. mikinnon had not been caught, who is to say how far he would have gone. by attacking the US government he was essenitally attacking the US people. we need to remember more then anything that in 9/11 and subsequent incidents it has been innocent civillians that have been hurt, if a government has information they need to keep quiet to help stop these things from happening then a man like mr. mikinnon has no right to intentionally disrupt or try to get at this information.
the fact that he got caught seems to be what is the issue here. and the mental illness, and extradition debates seem to be a smokescreen to take away from the fact that the man broke the law and needs to pay his penalty.

You are wrong. We could not extradite an Americn citizen without providing evidence, whereas merica cn extradite any U.K citizen on the strength of an allegation alone.

As Robert Gates from Homeland Security pointed out: There are tens of thousands of attacks on U.S computers every year.
Well no wonder if their security is so poor.

Gary McKinnon hs always denied the alleged damage.

Gary McKinnon does not boast about it and has always says he regrets it but let me ask you this....Would you rather a real terrorist had "alerted" the U.S to the fact that their security was virtually non existent?

Would you rather we had all been blown sky high which could have happened if Gary McKinnon had not woken the military up.

The Worlds Super Power had no passwords and no firewalls thus leaving the entire United States at risk.

Those military personell responsible should be prosecuted.

Gary McKinnon was on a dial up computer seven years ago, so can you imagine what a real terrorist with super dooper equipment could have done.

Gary McKinnon DID NOT attack the U.S computers, he trespassed and denies any "allegations" of damage.

No one has ever been extradited for computer misuse and nor should they be.

Get a sense of perspective.

@ crystal - I will try to address your points, so this will be a bit lengthy:

i'm from canada and just became aware of this situation as i was at a pink floyd website.

Welcome

having a mental disorder does not mean a person should be excused from commiting a crime. he knew what he was doing, and he was intentionally using his hacking to get into US restricted sites.

Correct. Mental disorders are relevant when determining an appropriate punishment,or fitness for a fair trial.

although the crime wasn't technically commited on US soil,

Technically the alleged offences were committed simultaneously both in the United Kingdom and in the United States. This causes the antiquated legal systems problems, which really need to be sorted out for the 21st century.

if mr mckinnon would have been a terrorist there would be no question about what should be done. justice needs to be blind.

Correct.

Justice also needs to be fair and blind, especially in terrorism cases, where false accusations and "guilt by association" allegations are so common, and where the mere accusation is enough to ruin your life forever, even if you are never charged or never found guilty.

However Gary was no terrorist, something which was obvious as soon as he was arrested back in April 2002.

When the US authorities got around to indicting him in the USA, over 6 months later, they were at pains to point out that they had no evidence of his involvement with espionage, terrorism or organised crime, and that no national security secrets had been compromised, and that he was working alone.

When they finally got around to asking for his extradition over 3 years later, there was still, obviously no evidence of any such serious criminal activity either.

He has not been charged with any such offences, neither in the USA, nor in the UK.

It is a fundamental principle of justice that you should only be tried on crimes which you have or may have committed, not on hypothetical ones which you could conceivably commit at some unspecified time in the future.

If you really think that that sort of thing is acceptable, them the terrorists will have won, by destroying our democratic society.

however, countries need to take all threats to themselves seriously, and while mr. mikinnon seems to act like this is a big joke what he did was very serious. for all the US knew mr. mickinnon was employed by al quada, or a member of a terrorist cell himself. he should be taken to the US to have a trial.

Why have you got such contempt for the British legal system ?

Do you really think that our courts cannot deal appropriately with alleged terrorists or alleged computer hackers ?

The Computer Misuse Act 1990 covers activities anywhere in the world.

Our catch all anti-terrorism laws (also with global scope) are some of the most draconian in the world - you can be held with charge for up to 42 days, without any evidence whatsoever.

There is no evidence that Gary was really considered to be a terrorist, even though various "cyber terror" and "cyber crime" publications and reports, usually angling for a bigger budget, have cited the case as highlighting potential future risks.

i wonder if the reverse had happened and a US citizen hacked into high ranking UK sites if many of you people here would feel the same about them as you do about mr. mikinnon.

Firstly, despite the incompetence of the UK military when it comes to physical security of laptop computers and USB memory devices etc, they were far better protected in regard to the internet than their US equivalents, partly as a result of being several years behind the USA in terms of getting connected to the internet.

They did and still do have firewalls (unlike the US systems at the time) and they never had blank systems administrator passwords (as the US systems did).

There are some other technical measures involving non-standard NT hash credentials, which would also have prevented attacks in the way which Gary and dozens of others from around the world (acting independently) seemed to be able to get into the US systems.

Any US based hacker, attacking UK systems, something which they do every day, would be dealt with in the USA if they were ever caught.

Nobody has ever been extradited from the USA, or to the UK, for any computer hacking offences.

A couple of eastern europeans have been conned into flying over to the UK or the USA, to be arrested on blackmail and extortion charges, but there have never been any extraditions at all.

Anybody facing the same charges as Gary, in the USA, would be allowed to have his lawyers cross examine the prima facie evidence against him in a US Court. That does not mean that the whole, detailed prosecution case would have to be presented, but it would mean that, for example, exaggerated claims for financial damage could be dealt with.

That is what should have happened with Gary, under the 1972 extradition treaty and the Extradition Act 1989, which was in force at the time of his alleged crimes and of his arrest in 2002.

However, a new , unfair extradition treaty was signed, without Parliamentary scrutiny, and a new Extradition Act 2003 was rubber stamped through Parliament by the Labour government, which had a big majority.

This was then applied retrospectively to Gary's case, and replaced the need for the US authorities to show any prima facie evidence, or indeed any evidence whatsoever, with mere allegations.

All of the legal appeals, through to the House of Lords and the European Court of Human Rights, have not been able to deal with the alleged facts ad evidence of the case, only general points of law.

if mr. mikinnon had not been caught, who is to say how far he would have gone. by attacking the US government he was essenitally attacking the US people. we need to remember more then anything that in 9/11 and subsequent incidents it has been innocent civillians that have been hurt, if a government has information they need to keep quiet to help stop these things from happening then a man like mr. mikinnon has no right to intentionally disrupt or try to get at this information. the fact that he got caught seems to be what is the issue here.

That is not the issue.

The issue is why were the US systems so vulnerable, due to an easily made and easily detected misconfiguration ?

These systems were vulnerable, not for a few hours or days, or even weeks, or months but for , both before and after the September 11th 2001 terrorist attacks, when security was supposed to have been tightened up, but which obviously was not done, in spite of public statements to the contrary.

More importantly, who was it who either failed to conduct proper checks during the supposed regular computer security audits, or who knew about the results of those audits and the widespread weaknesses, but deliberately chose to ignore them ?

Was this due to incompetence, corruption or treason amongst senior military officers and civilian sub-contractors and government officials ?

and the mental illness, and extradition debates seem to be a smokescreen to take away from the fact that the man broke the law and needs to pay his penalty.

Gary has always said that he was willing to face a British court, under United Kingdom law, and, if necessary to go to prison in the UK.

He has no chance of a fair trial in the USA. How can the jury pool at the Virginia Eastern District Court at Alexandria, which is surrounded by the Pentagon, the US Army communications centre at Fort Belvoir, the National Security Agency etc,,all of which Gary is accused of hacking into.

This is the same court used for high media profile trials like that of the "20th hijacker (failed) " etc. The jury pool must be entirely of people who either work for the US military and Intelligence agencies or the Federal Government, or major subcontractors, or who have relatives who do so.

They will come under immense peer pressure and threats to their careers and pensions, if they do not find Gary guilty.

Remember that none of the British detainees held in Guantanamo Bay were ever accused of directly attacking the US military, something which Gary is accused of.

If he had been charged in the UK , under the Computer Misuse Act 1990 (as other people who have broken into US computer s have in the past), then the case would have been heard in camera, i.e. mostly in secret, due to the involvement of allied intelligence agencies,

The ridiculous amounts of financial damage which have been alleged, without any proof, as opposed to damage to careers and reputations, would have been challenged by his lawyers and reduced dramatically.

He would probably have got a sentence of a few months at most,as a first time offender who has shown contrition.

Gary has only recently been diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome, so that topic did not come up in most of the legal proceedings so far.

The Judicial Review in June will consider if the Home Office should not have so lightly dismissed this medical condition in its rejection of Gary's appeals against extradition, but the facts of the case and any alleged evidence will still not be considered or challenged in a British court.

If Gary is sent to the USA, the US Government will waste a lot more money, and many senior military officers and officials and politicians will have to explain their incompetence, corruption or treason to the US public.

President Barack Obama, or his advisors, should see that it is in the USA's best interests, and in the interests of natural justice, to let Gary be tried here in the UK, rather than being extradited to the USA, something which would taint his administration with the mistakes of his predecessor President George W. Bush.

I keep reading these posts from people who justify their position in this matter by saying:

Gary denies committing any damage.

Gary only accessed systems that had default passwords.

Just curious...How will your stance change when this does finally go to trial and you learn from irrefutable evidence that Gary did access systems with stolen passwords and did in fact damage these systems by deleting files that prevented them from operating correctly...not just once, but on several systems?

We all know that Aspergers does not disable a person's conception of right or wrong.

What conclusion do you arrive at? Do you deny the facts and stand your ground or do you embrace the reality that you have all been lied to?

Should be interesting to witness...either way.

@ Eyes4Lies - why could this evidence not be heard and cross examined in a British court then ?

I don't know fg. I guess that is a question that you should be asking your Government. Oh!!! I'm sorry!!! I forgot. You have and they said no.

I can only surmise they do not want to spend honest tax payer's money on a trial where there are no victims in their country.

Send mail to Alison Saunders,..

http://www.dodonline.co.uk/engine.asp?showPage=body&Body=14748

This is correct; most people I know with autism (although not all) do visibly display emotions and expressions which indicate that they do know right from wrong.

In other words has Gary indicated or expressed in any way that the American authorities are unjust and have behaved unjustly towards him in a coherent manner, I would not know where to start as my specialty is basic survival.

Hiding ufo stuff, Free Energy or making people scare with something they created is another unjust thing or bad and/that could lead to a crime..

Find out or just let it happen.
You should thank Gary. Not the moron who cut him off.

i have stated my opinion and i am not going to sit and justify it again and again. however, i do have to say i have no contempt for the british government, but they were the ones that brought this extridition law into place, so its hard not to wonder what they were thinking.
to say gary is obviously not a terrorist...why because he is white, not muslim, what is your basis for this? a terrorist is any individual who poses a threat to national security, which he did, whether he "meant" to or not.
to say he should not be held responsible because the US government should have had better security is just plain stupid in my opinion. first off he shouldn't have been even trying to get into the sites to begin with. secondly the US government is the "victim" here. i use that term loosely, i am no lover of the US. but in terms of law they were the ones whom had a crime committed against them. so then, by your way of thinking if a woman gets shot by her spouse, she should have looked after herself better and not married him. it sounds pretty ridiculous, doesn't it.
you think gary would not get a fair trial in the US, you are basing this on what? the majority of americans are hard working fair indivduals. also a large majority of them are against the war, and they treatment of the detainees at guantamino. you sound like if he steps on US soil he will be automatically condemded. i'm not saying we should let mr mckinnon be tied to a stake and burned once on american soil, simply that he has a trial.
you can quote me laws and past court cases all you want, however the world changed after 9/11. there is no presedent for this situation, plain and simple.
we as a world can be against the US all we want. we can believe that they are unfair, and cocky. even that they brought the last decade's tragedies on themselves. but we all helped put them in this situation. through trading, being economically reliant ( like my home country canada), or by simply buying into the hollywood hype.
finally, the point of a trial is to determine if there is enough evidence to find him guilty. to sit here and go on about the lack of evidence or lack of guilt is not the point. and i did my research before i came here. i read the articles and watched the interviews. mr mckinnon often admits he to what he did, and how he ended up caught.
i'm sorry but your arguments for why this trial should happen in the UK seem to me to be the exact reasons it shouldn't. you blame the US government for the lack of security, you blame the UK government for their backwards extridition laws, you seem to blame everyone, except mr mckinnon, for the crime mr. mckinnon commited, and you want me to believe he will get a fair trial in the UK.
fair means not judged harshly, but it also means to not be judged mildly.

CS
Legal definitions for you to study...
ENTRAPEMENT- Entrapement is the act of encouraging someone to commit a crime that the individual may have had no intention of committing. - Illegal
COERSION- Coercion involves forcing or intimidating someone to testify or confess. - Illegal

CS - Unauthorized access is not a clearly defined technical situation is this case as it involved systems that were not properly configured firstly that is a case of negligence on part of the technical staff. Most hacking cases involve actually using extensive manipulation of vulnerabilities and persuing exploits to force an entry point other than a valid login as this case used. The detailed knowledge of systems and how to subvert them agressively entails a valid unauthorized access. And such that this is a grey area of law due to the fact that majority of people do not possess the faintest idea of how this is done and the clear intimate understanding of computers and networks is the reason why it is so grously missunderstood. Even securtity professionals have deetermined that it is such a grey area that the more important issue is what is done after the fact. Gary snooped around in the systems looking for information about UFO's and free energy. Hardly a crime.

Being that the state of or lack of the level of basic security on these military systems prior during and post none one one is probably the critical issue here. And obviously the military was compromised, the right thing to do would be to bring the entire technical staff before charges and have them answer to the US citizens why their systems were so compromised and have them held liable financially and face charges criminally for the horrible thing that occurred due to their lack of due diligence. But instead there is a news ban in north america and Gary is being hunted down by a lynch mob.

Crystal
FYI - Gary was not 'caught' - he left a note for the administrator commenting on how bad their security was. A real hacker with malicious intentions would not do this - think.

Obviously he was not using an onion router or otherwise concealing his IP in any way - as hardcore 'hackers' employ. So - this tells me there was no malicious intent. And by the letter of the law intent is EVERYTHING.

And when you say 'who knows how far he would have gone" what? How far would a guy had gone looking for ufo's airbrushed out of satelite pix? Maybe he would have been able to download the one he did find? What is your point? How far would he had gone? What exactly are you implying?
What?

Gary is a good man, a gentle spirit, an intelligent guy, an artist, there is not a malicious bone in his body. STOP buying into the spin trying to make him out to be a terrorist - he is not.

Elle

@ crystal

i have stated my opinion and i am not going to sit and justify it again and again.

Ok, but you are not changing our minds either.

however, i do have to say i have no contempt for the british government,

The current Labour government is increasingly unpopular, so you are in a minority.

but they were the ones that brought this extridition law into place, so its hard not to wonder what they were thinking.

The Extradition Act 2003 is opposed by all of the Opposition parties. The US legal authorities did not even ask for the "allegations only, no prima facie evidence required" provisions of the new traty and law. They certainly did not reciprocate regarding extraditions from the US to Britain.

to say gary is obviously not a terrorist...why because he is white, not muslim, what is your basis for this?

Neither the UK nor US governments have ever accused him of that, throughout the last 7 years.

What is your basis for such a false accusation ?

a terrorist is any individual who poses a threat to national security, which he did, whether he "meant" to or not.

Thankfully, that is not the accepted legal definition of terrorism !

By your definition, all of the US military senior managers, officials and politicians, who left their systems vulnerable to attack for several years on end, would be defined as "terrorists", which is simply wrong, even if they were negligent, incompetent, corrupt or were acting for a foreign intelligence agency.

to say he should not be held responsible because the US government should have had better security is just plain stupid in my opinion.

We keep pointing out the incompetent lack of security, to get a sense of proportion about the seriousness of the alleged offences, and to show why the culpable bureaucracy might be trying to pursue Gary with such unusual vigour, to divert attention from their own shame, incompetence or worse.

first off he shouldn't have been even trying to get into the sites to begin with. secondly the US government is the "victim" here. i use that term loosely, i am no lover of the US. but in terms of law they were the ones whom had a crime committed against them. so then, by your way of thinking if a woman gets shot by her spouse, she should have looked after herself better and not married him. it sounds pretty ridiculous, doesn't it.

No.

Gary is not claiming to be innocent. He has admitted wrong doing, apologised, and offered to plead guilty under the Computer Misuse Act 1990 in the UK,.

However, he and his supporters are asking for a fair, proportionate justice, here in the UK, something which is denied to foreigners in the USA, who are are accused of "attacking the US military".

you think gary would not get a fair trial in the US, you are basing this on what?

The failure of the US Government to provide to the UK extradition hearings, any written guarantee that Gary would only have to face a civilian trial once he is in US custody, and that President Bush's Military Order No.1 would not be invoked against him as "an enemy combatant".

The "jurisdiction shopping" decision to pick the "rocket docket" court in Alexandria, Virginia, with a jury pool of US military and Federal Government workers or relatives of such workers, to hear most of the charges against him, out of around a dozen US states where he could have been indicted.

The comments from a US prosecutor that they wanted to see Gary "fry".

The death threats, and male prison rape fantasies left here in the comments and by email from "patriotic" Americans..

you can quote me laws and past court cases all you want, however the world changed after 9/11. there is no presedent for this situation, plain and simple.

The terrorist threat has not changed, only the attitude of morally weak western politicians, who are letting the terrorists win, by destroying our civil liberties.

i'm sorry but your arguments for why this trial should happen in the UK seem to me to be the exact reasons it shouldn't.

Would you tolerate extradition from Canada to the USA , simply on the basis of exaggerated allegations, rather than having prima facie evidence being first cross examined in a Canadian court ?

you blame the US government for the lack of security, you blame the UK government for their backwards extridition laws, you seem to blame everyone, except mr mckinnon, for the crime mr. mckinnon commited, and you want me to believe he will get a fair trial in the UK.

The UK legal system is not quite as stupid as the current UK Government is, but it is constrained by the Extradition Act 2003.

Gary may not get a fair trial even in the UK, but he would stand a better chance of doing so than in the USA.

The Gary McKinnon case is the one that will cause this one sided extradition treaty to fall on it's face as it should.

British citizens, including very High Profile ones, are becoming increasingly aware that Brits are being treted as second class citizens in the eyes of the World.
We are intelligent enough to realise that Americans have been given significantly greater rights whilst British rights have been eroded, as this one sided treaty makes patently obvious to anyone with half a brain.

The Americans are using this treaty irresponsibly and in a recession/depression are spending Millions of Pounds on trying to extradite Gary McKinnon who they know fulwell is no threat to anyone.

The American authorities are trying to extradite our businessmen such as "Ian Norris" aged 65 yrs with prostate cancer,

Last year the U.S tried to extradite our hoteliers aged in their late seventies for alleged tax evasion "16 years ago"!....

Now it's our British Airways Executives,....

plus people selling things on the internet perfectly legally in this country but because Americans break the law they want to extradite the legal sellers of these products.

If our business men and women have Millions of Pounds the American government (as in the case of Mr & Mrs Tollman the hoteliers, The U.S have "accepted" payment of Millions of pounds and mny of their hotels to "allow" them to stay in their own country and not to be extradited. (Smacks of Extortion to me)....

but it is the Gary McKinnon case that will destroy this Treaty no matter what the people who try hard to deceive say.

The majority of Brits know the score only too well and with very High Profile people coming on board, the majority of Brits will rise to protect their own by having this one sided treaty ripped up for good.
It was signed in secret by a blind man and is a total betrayal of British citizens.

ok. this is the last time i am posting on this subject.
first if you are going to quote me please read my first post. i was simply answering the questions already posted to me from them. second if you are going to quote someone then quote the whole thought. its easy to make someone's points look bad when you only quote part of what was said.
i did not say gary was a terrorist. i simply said the US government had no way of knowing that at the time. you are the ones who first brought up terrorists.
every single one of you on here who is a supporter of gary that has replied to my posts has made this a personal matter. i am intitled to my opinion, just as you are yours. i am not trying to change your minds, i am simply trying to show another way of thinking about this situation.
you are the people who have called my intelligence into question. that i'm buying into a spin on terrorism, blah blah blah.
if you want to defend someone you have every right. but do so by sticking to facts, not calling down those you disagree with you.you will get a lot further in this world.