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Post by Frenchie on Aug 1, 2009 9:39:53 GMT 1
A Briton wanted in the United States for breaking into NASA and Pentagon computers in "the biggest military hack of all time" lost an appeal against his extradition on Friday, making a U.S. trial more likely.
Gary McKinnon, 43, has fought a three-year battle to avoid extradition, including going to the European Court of Human Rights, but he appeared to run out of options on Friday as Britain's High Court ruled against his latest appeal.
The court acknowledged arguments by defence lawyers that extraditing McKinnon, who was recently diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, a form of autism, could have disastrous consequences for his health, but said that while he may suffer by being extradited, the process of the law overruled those concerns.
"I have no doubt that he will find extradition to, and trial and sentence and detention in the United States, very difficult indeed," Lord Justice Stanley Burnton wrote in his judgement, accepting that even suicide could occur.
But ultimately he ruled that McKinnon's condition was not severe enough to set aside the process of the law.
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