Judge Finds Cisco, US Authorities Deceived Canadian Courts 165
djmurdoch writes "The Vancouver Sun reports that 'The giant computer company Cisco and US prosecutors deceived Canadian authorities and courts in a massive abuse of process to have a former executive thrown in jail, says a B.C. Supreme Court judge.' Peter Adelkeye was arrested last year as he was testifying in a special hearing in Vancouver. It turns out he was there because US authorities would not grant him permission to enter the US to testify in a civil case between him and Cisco. The Canadian judge said that almost nothing in the US Attorney's letter was true, and has overturned his extradition order. Slashdot discussed this case in April."
RCMP - Royal Canadian Monopoly Police (Score:3, Insightful)
Our top cops are always eager to serve big corp, especially if they're Uncle Sam's big corp.
Seriously, though (Score:5, Insightful)
When will the American populace finally tire of the country being for the corporations, of the corporations, and by the corporations and take it for the people instead?
I think I'm going to go try to find a non crazy group that's working on this. Are there any?
Or should i just join the ACLU and hope for the best?
Re:how much was actually done by the US gov't? (Score:4, Insightful)
I would imagine that an extradition request for a criminal complaint would have to come from the US Justice Department, perhaps even routed through the State Department. Random individuals can't ask governments to arrest people and ship them overseas. Random individuals can file suit in the other country and then that country can take steps as needed to keep the person there if warranted. In many countries however this would be inconvenient to a multinational - since they would be subject to loser-pays, security of costs, and all kinds of other things that they don't have to deal with in the US. And, of course, they have to convince the other country that they have jurisdiction.
Oh no... (Score:4, Insightful)
..a multinational corporation lied and the US government lied to protect it! What a huge surprise!
Re:I love my country (Score:2, Insightful)
State governments are surrounded by the People they govern. If a state government misbehaves, it only takes a short while to rally your neighbors and drive the 1-2 hours from your home to the capitol & remind the leaders that they can be deposed if they don't obey the citizens.
It is wiser to put most of the governmental power close to home, where the leaders are surrounded by their neighbors, rather than thousands of miles away in the Cone of Silence we call Washington. (Example: Three-quarter of the people opposed the Banker Bailout Bill, but it passed anyway, because congress doesn't care what we think.)
Re:Seriously, though (Score:4, Insightful)
The ACLU isn't remotely crazy. They are focused on the First, Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth amendments rather than the Second or Tenth, to be sure, and they take the absolute position on what "Congress shall make no law" is. That doesn't make them crazy. However, those who would like to get rid of those freedoms frequently portray them as crazy because they're a roadblock to their cause. For anyone who believes they're crazy, please present evidence of it, and I mean that absolutely seriously.
As far as government by, for, and of the corporations, that's been going on for at least 150 years now, and there's no reason to think it would stop anytime soon. If you want some idea of the history, I highly recommend A People's History of the United States [historyisaweapon.com].
Re:I love my country (Score:4, Insightful)
Defendant is the winner (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Soon to be jailed (Score:4, Insightful)
occams razor doesn't exlude simple conspiracies.
which is all most have to be.
a handful of powerful friends can fuck a lot of people over with very simple conspiracies like the one in the OP.
They can be as simple as
"we don't want him to give evidence? You write an official letter accusing him of something, I'll have an aide make up some bullshit rumors and spread those around and we'll try to make sure the court case is over before he's sorted out the mess"
or even "fuck the law, make up some charge that's hard to defend yourself against then arrest him and throw him in jail"
But those kinds of stories are boring.
massive conspiracies are hard to hold together but a few golf buddies can do fine.
Conspiracy nuts assume that the world trade centre was some kind of inside job with stupidly complex motives.
In reality there's no need for that when the same ends can be achieved by a far simpler method of politicians simply taking advantage of the situation after the fact to push through whatever horrific measures they've always wanted.
the problem isn't a deficit of trust.
Hell more problems are caused by trusting fools who believe campaign promises and press releases.
Re:Seriously, though (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, I'm totally fine with an organization that started with that kind of talk, for a lot of reasons:
1. I recognize that capitalist economics can and is used as a tool of oppression. I'm not as radical as Baldwin - I'm ok with a democratically elected government and the use of increase of wealth as a motivator for people to work. But like him, I'm not willing to allow pure capitalism to create a situation where workers are choosing between working at whatever rich people will pay, and dying of starvation, disease, or exposure to the elements.
2. He sees the US government as a tool of the megacorps of his day. He was generally right - this was at a time when people talking about forming trade unions were routinely attacked by police or arrested for saying that things would be much better if workers got together and demanded a 40 hour work week, safer working conditions, and enough pay to be able to feed their families.
3. Baldwin was talking in those terms when communists' primary goals were combating fascism in Europe and developing trade unions here in the US. He later revised his views on communism, notably in a 1953 article entitled "A new slavery; forced labor: the communist betrayal of human rights." which was largely about how Stalin in particular had undermined and betrayed everything communism was supposed to stand for.
4. Organizations change over time. To say the modern-day ACLU is mostly about Baldwin's socialism makes about as much sense as saying that the modern-day IBM is mostly about selling equipment to classify prisoners to the Nazis.