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US Ordered To Hand Over Megaupload Documents
An anonymous reader writes "A judge in New Zealand has ordered the U.S. government to hand over evidence seized in the Megaupload raid so Kim Dotcom and his co-defendants can use it to prepare a defense for an extradition hearing. The judge wrote, 'Actions by and on behalf of the requesting State have deprived Mr. Dotcom and his associates of access to records and information. ... United States is attempting to utilize concepts from the civil copyright context as a basis for the application of criminal copyright liability [which] necessitates a consideration of principles such as the dual use of technology and what they be described as significant non-infringing uses.' Once the defense attorneys have gathered and presented their evidence, the judge must decide whether the U.S. can make a reasonable case against Dotcom."
INAL but from what I've been reading it's more complex then that, the conspiracy/ racketeering and money laundering charges only stick if they can show criminal copyright infringement. Problem is copyright infringement is civil issue in NZ AND they need to show probable success of conviction for crimes with at least a 5 year jail term in NZ before extradition can even go ahead.
Conspiracy to commit a crime carries a maximum penalty of 5 years so qualifies, but they need to show both likely hood of conspiracy and the original crime.
A laymans example would be: I think you and your friend conspired to cheat on a test. I may have emails showing you conspired but I can't just have you extradited by showing conspiracy, I have to convince a judge that cheating on a test is a criminal offence first. A much taller order.
Also remember that the judge has already stated his displeasure with the failure to follow due process in the initial arrest and has required the crown to guarantee to cover costs and lost income if kim dotcom is not found guilty.
-Kactus
first-world / second-world originally meant US-aligned vs Soviet-aligned countries. The third-world meant unaligned countries.
"Statistically"?!?
USA was the world's largest manufacturer up to around 2009-2010, and has just been overtaken by China. Each of them produce around 20% of the total world's manufacturing output (40% combined).
How is 1/5th of the total manufacturing output "statistically very little"? Or are you just making up shit about something you have no clue about in the first place?
Why aren't you? Isn't he innocent until proven guilty? Right now, he's 100% innocent.
Innocent until proven guilty is correctly used with the verb "presumed", not "is". Whether he is innocent or guilty will not change in the coming months - either a crime has already been committed or it hasn't. However, he is presumed innocent until proven otherwise.