http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,9071448%5E15331%5E%5Enbv%5E15306-15318,00.html Simon Hayes MARCH 25, 2004 A MAGISTRATE has rejected an application to extradite an Australian man US authorities alleged headed an internet piracy syndicate. Hew Raymond Griffiths, 41, of Berkeley Vale on the NSW Central Coast, was indicted by a grand jury in the state of Virginia last year with one count of criminal copyright infringement and one count of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement. The US indictment alleged he was a member and later the leader of Drink or Die, a high-profile piracy ring founded in Russia in the 1990s, and later headquartered in the US. The indictment alleged Mr Griffiths controlled access to a drop site for pirated software at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology computer network. It was alleged the drop site often received software weeks ahead of a publishers' official release, and group members then cracked the copyright protection, testing the software and packing it. Downing Centre Local Court Magistrate Daniel Reiss said he was not persuaded that the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions, acting on behalf of US authorities, had made out a case for extradition. He highlighted the unusual nature of the matter, including that the offences were alleged to have occurred in Australia, and that Mr Griffiths - who had never travelled to the US - had "never been a fugitive fleeing or hiding from the extradition country". In his judgement, he said the case highlighted the need for Parliament to update extradition laws to take account of new technologies. "It appears that it would be timely for the parliament to give consideration to addressing the difficulties that have arisen over a number of years in respect to the scope and application (of the laws)," he said. "It also may be timely to give consideration to amending the Act to include provisions ... that can deal with the kind of factual circumstances that prevailed in respect to this application." Outside the court Mr Griffiths' Legal Aid Commission solicitor Antony Townsden said his client was relieved at the decision in what he described as an "outrageous" case. "A number of persons were charged in the UK and the US, but the only person where extradition was sought was Mr Griffiths," he said. "He is a person of no means whatsoever, and it was never suggested that he had gained anything of a material nature." "It would have been an impossible task for him to represent himself in the US, where he would have had no ties and no support in what would have been an extremely complex matter. "One would have thought it should have been tried in his own country." _______________________________________________ isn mailing list isn@private http://www.attrition.org/mailman/listinfo/isn
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Fri Mar 26 2004 - 01:39:25 PST