As the judicial review of the proposed extradition of Gary McKinnon continues, his ever-growing band of supporters claim that the 43 year old should not be extradited on human rights grounds. Not only are they fighting a losing battle, Mr McKinnon should be extradited.

Mr McKinnon has become something of a cause celebre for the right of centre media, who believe that his proposed extradition is another example of the United Kingdom’s increasing subservience to the United States. The facts of the case contradict their assertions entirely. Gary McKinnon was initially charged in the United Kingdom for his offences, but for legal and constitutional reasons Mr McKinnon cannot be tried here. Understandably, considering there is no doubt Mr McKinnon is guilty of what has been termed “the biggest military hack in history”, the US administration asked for his extradition, which the UK government agreed with. The UK government did not “comply with a request” for fear of losing the friendship and support of the US; they wanted to have Mr McKinnon prosecuted in this country, but this was impossible.

Leaving these details aside, Mr McKinnon has been portrayed as a childlike individual whose exuberance and enthusiasm led him to attack US military computers to search for evidence of UFOs. Nonsense. Mr McKinnon was a senior system analyst and had made previous political statements on websites he was a member of; many of these websites were based entirely on hacking. To pretend that he did not target US servers on political and supposedly moral grounds is absurd. His actions put lives at risk, especially amongst the US Navy, whose location details he deleted. He did this two months after the September 11th attacks. He taunted the US security establishment with threats of further attacks until they “stopped bombing people”, stating that he would “continue to disrupt at the highest levels”.

His Aspergers Syndrome is a sensitive topic few have dared to touch. To suggest he should not be imprisoned due to a relatively mild mental illness is preposterous, and also ignores the fact that much of the prison population suffers from serious mental illnesses. It is doubtful that Mr McKinnon would be receiving the same level of support if he had not committed a “cyber crime”, which many seem to consider oddly harmless. Blaming this entire episode on his Aspergers is horribly misjudged considering the overtly political nature of the attacks. One can only imagine the apoplectic rage of the Daily Mail if an American had committed the same crime against the UK security forces, and his extradition was being challenged in contravention of justice. He might suffer, but he should. He committed a serious crime for which he should be punished, just as anyone else without a PR juggernaut behind them would.

Filed under: clarepoliticsnews, democracy, terrorism on January 11th, 2010