[AicapAifap] Opinion

[Alliance of Incarcerated Canadians/Foreigners in American Prisons]

DemocracyPost 
A British court rules that sending defendants to the U.S. prison
system is a human rights violation By Rebecca Shaeffer February 7 at
10:23 AM Lauri Love, center, smiles with parents Alexander Love, left,
Sirkka-Liisa Love, second left, and girlfriend Sylvia Mann as he
leaves the Royal Courts of Justice in London on Monday. (Kirsty
Wigglesworth/AP) Rebecca Shaeffer is a senior legal and policy officer
at Fair Trials, a global criminal justice watchdog operating out of
Washington, London and Brussels. President Trump and Attorney General
Jeff Sessions have repeatedly highlighted
https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/attorney-general-sessions-delivers-remarks-international-association-chiefs-police
the importance of international cooperation in tackling international,
cyber and cross-border crime
https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/attorney-general-sessions-delivers-remarks-global-forum-asset-recovery-hosted-united.
But as a decision of the United Kingdom’s High Court on Monday shows
https://www.judiciary.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/lauri-love-v-usa.pdf,
human rights abuses in the U.S. criminal justice system are putting
that cooperation at risk even with our closest allies. In the ruling,
the High Court refused to order the extradition of British-Finnish
activist Lauri Love to the United States, where he is wanted on
hacking charges, on the grounds that sending him to an American jail
would be “oppressive” due to poor conditions there. The court
accordingly found that the interests of justice required the case to
be prosecuted in Britain instead. This decision marks the first time a
U.K. court has used the “forum bar
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/41/section/19B,” a 2013
extradition reform that allows British courts to halt extraditions in
situations where defendants could be prosecuted instead in the United
Kingdom. (Specifically, the wanted person must have strong ties to the
U.K., the alleged conduct must have occurred mainly on British soil,
and a reasonable argument can be made that the interests of justice
would be better served by prosecution there.) The U.K. Parliament
adopted the forum bar after an outcry over a string
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/oct/16/gary-mckinnon-not-extradited-may
of cases
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/10/04/babar-ahmad-extradition-us_n_1939282.html
in which the United States asserted prosecutorial jurisdiction over
conduct that occurred entirely in the U.K. Although several political
factors were at play, the extradition reform movement was largely
fueled by public concern that defendants’ basic rights will not be
respected in U.S. custody. 
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/democracy-post/wp/2018/02/07/a-british-court-rules-that-sending-defendants-to-the-u-s-prison-system-is-a-human-rights-violation/?utm_term=.0794

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