Pentagon hackerGary McKinnonhas launched a legal challenge against
the director of public prosecutions (DPP), claiming that he should
be prosecuted in the UK for his crime of breaking into military
computer systems, instead of being extradited to face charges in
the US.
The High Court will hold a judicial review on Tuesday into the
Home Office's decision. McKinnon faces 60 years in jail for
allegedly disrupting US military computer networks and causing
millions of dollars of damage.
McKinnon applied in May for a judicial review of the DPP's
decision to disregard his autism when making its decision in
February not to prosecute him in the UK.
"The director's decision is procedurally flawed and unlawful for
it wrongly fails to consider and analyse important expert medical
evidence concerning the effects of extradition on the claimant and
his mental health," said Edward Fitzgerald and Ben Cooper,
barristers for McKinnon, in the application.
Medical experts including Simon Baron-Cohen, a renowned
Cambridge University autism expert, said in documents sent to the
Crown Prosecution Service in December that extradition and
long-term incarceration in a US jail could exacerbate his autism,
leading to psychosis and even suicide. A UK trial would allow him
to be brought to justice within the invaluable support network of
his family.
The DPP said he could not prosecute McKinnon in the UK because
it did not have the evidence on which to base the prosecution. The
2003 Extradition Act allowed the US to request McKinnon's
extradition without supplying prima facie evidence.
The CPS said it could also not consider McKinnon's autism until
it had considered the evidence. It approved a US prosecution
because that was where the evidence was located. It gave other
practical reasons for a US prosecution, but McKinnon challenged the
DPP to consider also the "humanitarian" reasons for prosecuting him
in the UK, citing the Human Rights Act.