US says it has right to kidnap British citizens

[Guardsman Bass]

AMERICA has told Britain that it can “kidnap” British citizens if they are wanted for crimes in the United States.

A senior lawyer for the American government has told the Court of Appeal in London that kidnapping foreign citizens is permissible under American law because the US Supreme Court has sanctioned it.

The admission will alarm the British business community after the case of the so-called NatWest Three, bankers who were extradited to America on fraud charges. More than a dozen other British executives, including senior managers at British Airways and BAE Systems, are under investigation by the US authorities and could face criminal charges in America.

Until now it was commonly assumed that US law permitted kidnapping only in the “extraordinary rendition” of terrorist suspects.
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The American government has for the first time made it clear in a British court that the law applies to anyone, British or otherwise, suspected of a crime by Washington.

Legal experts confirmed this weekend that America viewed extradition as just one way of getting foreign suspects back to face trial. Rendition, or kidnapping, dates back to 19th-century bounty hunting and Washington believes it is still legitimate.

The US government’s view emerged during a hearing involving Stanley Tollman, a former director of Chelsea football club and a friend of Baroness Thatcher, and his wife Beatrice.

The Tollmans, who control the Red Carnation hotel group and are resident in London, are wanted in America for bank fraud and tax evasion. They have been fighting extradition through the British courts.

During a hearing last month Lord Justice Moses, one of the Court of Appeal judges, asked Alun Jones QC, representing the US government, about its treatment of Gavin, Tollman’s nephew. Gavin Tollman was the subject of an attempted abduction during a visit to Canada in 2005.

Jones replied that it was acceptable under American law to kidnap people if they were wanted for offences in America. “The United States does have a view about procuring people to its own shores which is not shared,” he said.

He said that if a person was kidnapped by the US authorities in another country and was brought back to face charges in America, no US court could rule that the abduction was illegal and free him: “If you kidnap a person outside the United States and you bring him there, the court has no jurisdiction to refuse — it goes back to bounty hunting days in the 1860s.”

Mr Justice Ouseley, a second judge, challenged Jones to be “honest about [his] position”.

Jones replied: “That is United States law.”

He cited the case of Humberto Alvarez Machain, a suspect who was abducted by the US government at his medical office in Guadalajara, Mexico, in 1990. He was flown by Drug Enforcement Administration agents to Texas for criminal prosecution.

Although there was an extradition treaty in place between America and Mexico at the time — as there currently is between the United States and Britain — the Supreme Court ruled in 1992 that the Mexican had no legal remedy because of his abduction.

In 2005, Gavin Tollman, the head of Trafalgar Tours, a holiday company, had arrived in Toronto by plane when he was arrested by Canadian immigration authorities.

An American prosecutor, who had tried and failed to extradite him from Britain, persuaded Canadian officials to detain him. He wanted the Canadians to drive Tollman to the border to be handed over. Tollman was escorted in handcuffs from the aircraft in Toronto, taken to prison and held for 10 days.

A Canadian judge ordered his release, ruling that the US Justice Department had set a “sinister trap” and wrongly bypassed extradition rules. Tollman returned to Britain.

Legal sources said that under traditional American justice, rendition meant capturing wanted people abroad and bringing them to the United States. The term “extraordinary rendition” was coined in the 1990s for the kidnapping of terror suspects from one foreign country to another for interrogation.

There was concern this weekend from Patrick Mercer, the Tory MP, who said: “The very idea of kidnapping is repugnant to us and we must handle these cases with extreme caution and a thorough understanding of the implications in American law.”

Shami Chakrabarti, director of the human rights group Liberty, said: “This law may date back to bounty hunting days, but they should sort it out if they claim to be a civilised nation.”

The US Justice Department declined to comment.

Posted without comment, for now.

[Keevan_Colton]

Right, interesting...so when do we start kidnapping people from the US to be brought up on charges of kidnapping in Britain?

[Havok]

Write a law that allows you to do so.

[RIPP_n_WIPE]

Well it's about time we got the lobster backs back for inpressibg our sailors!

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Place armed guards around your subjects who are wanted in the United States and give them permission to use lethal force, I suppose.

[Havok]

Place armed guards around your subjects who are wanted in the United States and give them permission to use lethal force, I suppose.

I have a CRAZY idea. Don't break laws in other countries and this won't be an issue.

[Havok]

GE: Didn't mean to quote you, or anyone for that matter, Duchess.

[Enigma]

I have a CRAZIER idea. How about stop making stupid laws like kidnapping people in foreign countries.

Gee breaking laws to kidnap alleged criminals.

[Darth Wong]

I have a CRAZY idea. Don't break laws in other countries and this won't be an issue.

You've said bad things about Islam. This makes you subject to the death penalty in certain countries.

[Phantasee]

I have a CRAZY idea. Don't break laws in other countries and this won't be an issue.

You've said bad things about Islam. This makes you subject to the death penalty in certain countries.

But if you haven't said these things while in Riyadh (or where ever the law applies), does it count?

[Gullible Jones]

That's the thing, it may be US law but that doesn't matter - you're kidnapping someone within Britain's borders, and British law applies there.

[Darth Wong]

I have a CRAZY idea. Don't break laws in other countries and this won't be an issue.

You've said bad things about Islam. This makes you subject to the death penalty in certain countries.

But if you haven't said these things while in Riyadh (or where ever the law applies), does it count?

Ask a Sharia court in Saudi Arabia. Personally, I wouldn't want to go there and find out.

[Norseman]

You've said bad things about Islam. This makes you subject to the death penalty in certain countries.

But if you haven't said these things while in Riyadh (or where ever the law applies), does it count?

Ask a Sharia court in Saudi Arabia. Personally, I wouldn't want to go there and find out.

A German cartoonist was threatened by extradition to Greece because his book "The Life of Jesus" was deemed blasphemous in Greece. link. So yeah making blasphemous, defamatory, or other Bad Speak type of statements online, where they can be read by anyone anywhere, could very well be treated as a criminal offence by quite a number of jurisdictions.

Likewise if you're based out of Britain, but your company breaks the law in the US, you have quite possibly broken US laws. Or of, say, you download online music, or DVDs, or... well what have you?

[Norseman]

P.S. A Shariah court has universal jurisdiction, and is competent to issue a ruling for any crime committed anywhere in the world. Provided of course that a local court hasn't done so already. So a Shariah court can sentence you to death for blasphemous writings, issue a bounty, and have a fair chance of seeing the sentence carried out.

[Havok]

I have a CRAZY idea. Don't break laws in other countries and this won't be an issue.

You've said bad things about Islam. This makes you subject to the death penalty in certain countries.

I have?

Even if that were true, I didn't go to THAT country and do it, did I?

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

This can't end well if it's upheld. How long until Saudi Arabia passes a law stating anyone in America, Britain, Europe, or anywhere else can be subject to kidnapping (or 'Extraordinary Rendition' as the Bushies call it) for crimes whether or not they were committed on Saudi soil? That's only a very tiny step beyond this law as it stands already.

Enforcing your law on foreign people who haven't agreed to live under it, pay taxes to support its originating government, or be represented is extremely wrong.

You've said bad things about Islam. This makes you subject to the death penalty in certain countries.

But if you haven't said these things while in Riyadh (or where ever the law applies), does it count?

Ask a Sharia court in Saudi Arabia. Personally, I wouldn't want to go there and find out.

How long before they 'invite' you to a Sharia Court if this shit goes where it looks like it's heading? This is an extremely dangerous precedent.

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

P.S. A Shariah court has universal jurisdiction, and is competent to issue a ruling for any crime committed anywhere in the world. Provided of course that a local court hasn't done so already. So a Shariah court can sentence you to death for blasphemous writings, issue a bounty, and have a fair chance of seeing the sentence carried out.

'Universal jurisdiction', ha. I find that blasphemous. No human group, even one congregated in the name of any deity or god, shall ever be granted omniscience, omnipotence, or omnipresence in jurisdiction over the whole of the Universe or any others; especially one that can fall to prejudice and hate, or one that presumes to grant itself godlike powers by fiat.

Humans are not worthy to rule all in our current sorry state. We must grow up first and let go of our hate.

[The Yosemite Bear]

now when Chapman kidnapped a rapist from Mexico he broke the law, and should be extradited. now how about Weisenthal when he and his fellows entered a south american country illegally in order to kidnap Eichmann?

[Norseman]

now when Chapman kidnapped a rapist from Mexico he broke the law, and should be extradited. now how about Weisenthal when he and his fellows entered a south american country illegally in order to kidnap Eichmann?

I think Weissenthal and company would admit to breaking the law when they nabbed Eichmann, but that guy was so utterly evil that most people would let it slide; exception that proves the rule.

[The Yosemite Bear]

exactly, and I think that kidnapping a foreign national from another country in clear violation of treaty has to be done only in cases like eichmann's

[Havok]

This can't end well if it's upheld. How long until Saudi Arabia passes a law stating anyone in America, Britain, Europe, or anywhere else can be subject to kidnapping (or 'Extraordinary Rendition' as the Bushies call it) for crimes whether or not they were committed on Saudi soil? That's only a very tiny step beyond this law as it stands already.

Enforcing your law on foreign people who haven't agreed to live under it, pay taxes to support its originating government, or be represented is extremely wrong.

But if you haven't said these things while in Riyadh (or where ever the law applies), does it count?

Ask a Sharia court in Saudi Arabia. Personally, I wouldn't want to go there and find out.

How long before they 'invite' you to a Sharia Court if this shit goes where it looks like it's heading? This is an extremely dangerous precedent.

I don't see it that way. This law is for people that break the law IN our country, not the laws OF our country. The British bankers, broke our laws while conducting business here that directly effected our citizens.

[Havok]

now when Chapman kidnapped a rapist from Mexico he broke the law, and should be extradited. now how about Weisenthal when he and his fellows entered a south american country illegally in order to kidnap Eichmann?

Doesn't this help Dog's case?

[The Yosemite Bear]

I would guess so, except that he's already been found guilty in absentia in Mexico....

[Havok]

I would guess so, except that he's already been found guilty in absentia in Mexico....

Weren't we going to extradite him though? I guess now, if they want him they have to come get him. Should be an exciting episode. "Dog Vs The Federalies"

[Sea Skimmer]

Place armed guards around your subjects who are wanted in the United States and give them permission to use lethal force, I suppose.

The invasion of Panama would suggest that that wouldn’t be enough if we want the person badly enough.