KevGlobal said…
Denis, just to clarify, I have written about this case for the Guardian. However, the post that you’ve linked to is on my personal blog and are my personal views. I need to make the disclaimer a little stronger on my personal blog, but I just wanted to make it clear.

As an American working for British media since 1998, I can understand the coverage in terms of upset over what was seen as an unfair extradition treaty, much of which was remedied after the Natwest case.

Let me be clarify one point: The length of his sentence. A quick call to the prosecuting attorney in the case of even quoting the AP coverage would make it clear that McKinnnon is not facing 60 years in prison. In Lord Brown’s ruling against McKinnon’s request for a stay of extradition, he wrote:

“On this basis it was likely that a sentence of 3-4 years (more precisely 37-46 months), probably at the shorter end of that bracket, would be passed and that after serving 6-12 months in the US, the appellant would be repatriated to complete his sentence in the UK.”

British judges have stated this. The US attorney in charge of prosecuting this case has stated the length of the sentence as less than four years, not 60. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not to their own facts.

Kevin Anderson

June 18, 2009 3:37 PM

Denis Campbell said…
Thank you Kevin for your response and do note that this article appears here on Charley’s blog today as well as, Huffington Post, ukprogressive.co.uk (my publication), laprogressive.com, Facebook, Friendfeed and Twitter

I will be happy to update the article and make sure that you as author from the blog and not connected to The Guardian. Simply, you came up during my research and that was how you described yourself on the blog.

While I agree to a point with your sentencing assertion there are too many “wild cards” and other case history that for space reasons did not make it into the article. I assure you neither pulled the figure out of thin air nor simply bought into the McKinnon/Sharp version of the case. While UK sentencing estimates may look good, US sentencing guidelines are closer to 70 years if he is labeled a terrorist and thus convicted. In my research, I looked at other extraditions and/or prosecutions of UK nationals, others labeled as “terrorists” or those suffering from mental illness in the US .

In conversation with two Federal prosecutors Gary faces charges in two jurisdictions and because he did not cooperate the first time could (emphasis on could) be viewed with much more hostility on the part of prosecutors in both.

The cases of Billy Cotrell, eco-terrorist; Chantal McCorkle, infomercial fraud (not allowed repatriation to UK to serve sentence and was kept in higher security and deemed a flight risk), Aaron Caffrey, Port Houston computer hacker, death row inmate Andre Thomas, a young man who pulled out and ate his own eye, the Blakely and Booker US Supreme Court case on sentencing guidelines and others… coupled with having worked in the US Justice system for two very prominent solicitor firms and sought the advice of former colleagues on this article, no one could give me any reason from that side of the Pond to minimize my sentence expectation.

Simply, the longer he fights, the angrier they get and the more he loses.

Thanks though for your thoughtful reply. I will post this thread after Charley does on the other locations and anything you add further in reply.

All the best,

Denis Campbell

June 18, 2009 4:43 PM