Question

I hope no one minds my posting a question here. I don't have autism but my father had Asperger's. I read this article in the UK press about a guy being extradited to the US for hacking

Lauri Love verdict: British hacker who breached US defence systems to be extradited despite Asperger?s | The Independent

What do you think about it? I know he committed a crime, and some of them are serious, but I don't understand why they want him to be tried in America and not England. He will probably go to prison and he would be better in a British prison than a US one, where at least his family could visit. It all seems very sad.

I'd be interested to hear people's opinions.

Hello Little Cat: Well... I don't know about this. The Skeezyks tends not to have much of an opinion with regard to these sorts of things. It does strike me though, & I don't even know why really, that there's something wrong with a citizen of the U.K. being extradited to the U.S. (or any other country for that matter) to face charges. If this person did something wrong, try him in the country where he is a citizen. For me, the fact that this person has Asperger's is beside the point.

The thing is that the crime was done against the US therefore it is tried under US laws which is why they must extradite him to the US.

The law works that way even within our states. The state that the crime is done in is where they have to actually be arrested after extradition. We are dealing with 43 counts of horse abuse against a father & daughter. The father came back after abandoning the horses. The daughter left the state. In this case because only a misdemeanor they won't extradite her back to this state but if she ever shows up here, she will be arrested & charged with the crime in the state it was committed. National laws bring them back to the country the crime was committed against. It's the agreements that countries have made for enforcing penalties against criminal action.

The fact that he has Aspergers has nothing to do with the crime....a broken law is a broken law no matter who does it & isn't an excuse for not having the moral character not to have done it.

Thanks eskielover. Good explanation. I think I'm struggling to understand why he will be extradited and not others, because there have been other Brits who've done this
Hacker Gary McKinnon will not face UK charges - BBC News
And people like Terry Waite have spoken out in defence of him, saying that the US should be "grateful" for someone pointing out the weaknesses in their computer systems. Other psychiatrists have said that the 'mind blindness' that some people with autism have, which makes them obsessed with the search for truth, is a disability which led to the crime, so less culpable.
There was another case where a guy committed suicide before he could be extradited. It seems to have happened several times, so there's sufficient case law, but there must be something specific about this incident that's leading them to push for him to go to the US stronger than the others.

as we all know aspergers is high functioning autism,he doesnt have intellectual disability and thus have reduced mental capacity,he knows what he was doing,you do the crime you do the time.
yes he may have been compelled to hack because of his obsession with the truth but he knows the law.
however i think as a vulnerable adult he should be tried and imprisoned over here in the UK as he needs to see his family/friends,he coud be sent into depression and suicide attempts if he was sent to the USA where he doesnt know anyone or anywhere plus i wonder should he be put on the wing for people who need safety from general population as he would likely be vulnerable on the normal wings.

This reminds me of that case of the school shooter that had autism, they tried to use it as an excuse then too. Autism is not an excuse. It deeply bothers me when its used as such.

As for where time is served.. imho if a grown person makes a choice, they must see through the consequenses of their actions, be it in another country or not.

Can't answer without going into politics.

But I will say it is sick and disgusting to steal other countries' citizens.

I won't be so sure about that. I don't have much trust in the US military justice system, DoD, NSA or whatever. Chinese hackers could be plotting to bring the whole US infrastructure down, just biding time till the timing's right, it is called patience. We all have the same human minds, capable of strategizing a war tactics. US domestic and foreign enemies are growing in numbers, I just think hackers always have an upper hand knows more truth than any of us can ever know.

It's a matter of laws, foreign relations, we often see news that don't sit well with us. Hate and dissonance may empower the enemy, may create new enemies. American heroes of the past, I just can't see the foreign power in the same light as before.

I haven't read the whole article, I can't say how I'd feel about the asperger connection. Great post, thank you.