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DrinkOrDie Warez Trader to be Extradited to U.S.
femto writes "Hew Raymond Griffiths, alleged to be one of the leaders of the warez group DrinkOrDie, is to be extradited to the United States after losing an appeal. The case is of interest as the appeal was based on the fact that during the offences, alleged to have been committed in the US, the accused did not leave Australia."
"DrinkOrDie is one of the oldest and most sophisticated software pirate groups within the 'Warez' community, which is a loose, global network of Internet pirate gangs."
If these guys don't have eye patches and peg legs I am going to be SO disappointed.
Aarrrrrrrr.
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It was common throughought ancient Europe for the citizens of Rome's provinces or client states to be subject to its laws and legal process - often above and beyond those of their own state or tribe. But at least the Romans had enough decency to openly call it an Empire!
illegally cracked security codes and reproduced software, games and music worth $US50 million ($71.6 million).
....
Griffiths, who is unemployed and lives with his parents, was ordered to pay costs.
The mother, the mother! Why wont someone think of the mother?!
The Australian government does whatever the US tells it to do these days.
This case is yet another reason why the rest of the world needs to band together to curb the lawlessness of the current US administration.
In a legal dispute between a DrinkOrDie member and the United States Government, why link to a United States Government document on the group? It's a little biased.
Wikipedia, perhaps a more neutral source, has an article on DrinkOrDie
According to the article the guy being extradited is 42 years old, unemployed and lives with his parents.
How did this guy ever come under suspicion of cracking software and posting it on the Net?
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I thought (most) countries don't extradite their own citizens, no matter what. At the very least not for relatively minor offenses like this.
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I'm not sure how good or relevant an analogy this would be, but I'm thinking it would be like if I, as a Canadian, hired a hitman to kill a U.S. citizen in the U.S. Although I would never have left Canada, my actions would directly influence crimes committed in the United States. Since he likely had fileservers based in the US under his control, that would justify calling it a crime based in the US. Physical location honestly doesn't seem to have a lot of relevance anymore, since a lot of crimes can be done digitally from the other side of the world, and don't require physical access.
IANAL so I don't know all the specifics of extraditions....
However, I am not sure that this is all bad in most cases. Usually extradition deals require a fair amount of dealmaking between the prosecution and the extraditing courts. Usually there is some level of protection of the rights that a person has before extradition. So if someone cannot be tried for the death penalty in the extraditing state, usually this is a condition of extradition. You can imagine what might happen if Osama Bin Ladin were to be captured in a country that has no death penalty (say the UK), the international politics that might result...
So often extradition is not the trampling on rights that people are afraid it might be.
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As an American I've been wondering for a while why your government pretty much does whatever we tell them to do, without any sort of problems with resentment, national pride, or even seemingly rational thought. I can never see an American being extridited to Australia for an alleged crime, who has never actually been to Australia. I know that Howard is an ass (the opinion of most aussies I meet). But being a total neo-conservative prick doesn't really explain it, especially in cases like this. What do you really think the Australian government gets for being our lapdog?
Hey, I bet the US wasn't the only place he committed these offences. He probably uploaded and infringed on software products all over the world.
Why should the US have sole custody of the guy? Why not visit Japan and England as well on a government sponsored world tour? If he is lucky, there may be a few Eastern Bloc countries as well.
I agree with the tone of that article. I think this ruling is very bad, for some very good reasons:
I would have demanded my money back for several software packages if a warez version didn't fix the problems with copy protection. The software industry should be kissing this guy's ass, not putting him in jail.
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Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
There are pirate gangs now? Arrrr, I best be hiding my booty.
If this guy's headed for Federal Prison, that's a good plan.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Judge: So what evidence do you have? Perhaps some incriminating documents?
Prosecution: No.
Judge: Surveillence tapes?
Proescution: Er, no.
Judge: Wiretap?
Prosecution: Not today, your honor, no.
Judge: Well what *do* you have?
Prosecution: Well, it's quite simple. Barring the creation of some kind of hyper-intelligent android (which we shall call EvilHackingPirateScumBot), the man responsible for these reprehensible acts MUST be a human being...
Judge: Go on...
Prosecution: Now, I direct your attention to exhibit A--the defendant. As can be clearly seen, he is in fact a human!
Judge: My God, you're right!
Prosecution: So, from this, we can clearly see that since the man we are after is a human, and the defendant is also a human, then he must have done it!
Judge: You know, you're right! Bailiff, take this man away.
Prosecution: (haha, suckers)
Judge: But you know, I can't help but notice that you're a human as well...
Prosecution: Well, I hardly think...
Judge: I see now, this was all just a ploy! Bailiff, arrest every human in this courtroom, and then throw yourself in a cell...
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I good example would be that Pornography in Australia has a minimum age of 16 whereas in America is 18, therefore sites like hushhush.com are illegal in the states. Should the webmasters be extrodited as child pornographers?
so in other words, you're open to extraditing americans to saudi arabia because they violated saudi religious heresy laws?
how about extraditing salman rushdie to iran? they have a long standing death sentence on him for violating iranian law. he _is_ guilty as all hell, after all.
How about being prosecuted in Canada? I understand, that I will prosecuted according to the laws of the country I currently reside and to the laws of the country I am citizen of, as it is my duty to be acquainted with both.
However, I cannot possibly be held responsible for the effects of my actions in every possible country of the world and their respective laws.
To take an extreme example: In China, distributing pornography is a crime, which can be punished with death penalty. Should one maintain a pornographic page, one certainly could affect the Chinese populace. Does that mean one should be extradited to China?
"Between strong and weak, between rich and poor [...], it is freedom which oppresses and the law which sets free"
And equally, should American pornographers like Hefner be extradited to Saudi Arabia?
The real Ralph Yarro posts as Anonymous Coward. Anyone else is an impostor.
Copyright infringement isn't a criminal act in Australia
Additional sections exist for nondigital distribution, other modes of violation, etc. Source: Australian Copyright Act of 1968, as amended.
The thing that is most disturbing about this is not that people can get extradited for copyright violations, it is that the US can get someone to be extradited for this, but that hell would freeze over before the US would extradite a US citizen for this kind of offense to another nation.