Yesterday’s announcement from May was primarily two-fold: that McKinnon should not be extradited on health grounds, and that judges would in future decide which jurisdiction would best serve justice in future extradition cases. This leaves O’Dwyer’s fate in the balance: he does not have health issues like McKinnon, and there is ample legal precedent for his extradition.
O’Dwyer’s offense was that he ran a website (TVShack) that provided links to illegal copies of copyrighted material. For this reason the US has sought his extradition to face trial in America. But neither O’Dwyer nor his servers were located in the United States, and he has committed no obvious offense in the UK – he has not been charged with anything by the UK authorities. This has persuaded many – including Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia – to believe his extradition would be contrary to natural justice.
Back in April, Anonymous launched #OpTrialAtHome in protest against the extradition of McKinnon, O’Dwyer and Chris Tappin. The Tappin reference was illustrative since he had already been extradited. McKinnon has now been saved by May. That just leaves O’Dwyer – and today AnonUKIre (an amalgamation of several different UK and Irish groups) will resurrect the operation to keep him in the UK.
“Anonymous have been campaigning against the unlawful extradition arrangements between the UK and the US for some time, an extradition policy that forces UK nationals to go to the US and experience ‘Hobson’s choice justice’: you agree to this plea bargain you will get a short sentence, if you fight for justice in front of a foreign jury and if you lose you will spend the rest of your life in a US jail,” announces AnonUKIre.
In the April operation, the Home Office website was targeted and knocked off-line. Today things are different since it is the Home Office that has saved McKinnon. Anonymous recognizes this. “Credit to Theresa May for standing for defending those who cannot defend themselves, a code we live by,” it says. At the same time, however, Anonymous is unwilling to let things slide over O’Dwyer.
Today it warns, “While the current Government have started to respond to the concerns of the UK electorate on extradition, the Labour Party are still trying to defend their failures. It is for this reason we are looking at new #OpTrialAtHome operation against former home secretaries of the previous Government and who are trying to defend it.”