Home secretary Theresa May has been accused of “double standards” for refusing to extradite the Duchess of York to Turkey.
Christopher Hope
By Christopher Hope, Senior Political Correspondent
10:00PM GMT 16 Jan 2012
Lawyers and campaigners pointed out that the same legislation is being used to extradite a British student to America for alleged copyright breaches.
The Duke of York’s former wife is accused of “violating” the privacy of children at state–run orphanages by filming them covertly for a television documentary in 2008.
Mrs May is refusing to accede to the request because the charge does not constitute an offence under British law.
However lawyers and campaigners pointed out that under the same legislation the UK has agreed to extradite a British student to America for alleged copyright breaches.
Richard O’Dwyer, 23, a computer science student at Sheffield Hallam University faces up to 10 years in prison for operating a website called ‘TVShack’.
His legal team argued in court last week that running TVShack was not an offence in Britain, because it did not host copyright material and European law says no crime is committed if a website acts as a “mere conduit”.
However, Judge Purdy rejected the argument because the student had control over what links were posted. He set up a second website a day after authorities shut down the first in July 2010.
Yesterday, Mr O’Dwyer’s mother Julia accused the Home Office of “double standards” and having different standards for “princes and paupers”.
Mrs O’Dwyer said: “I cannot understand the discriminatory attitude of the Home Office towards these two cases.
“If there is no crime committed by UK standards then, prince or pauper, you should be protected from extradition by your own government.
“By failing to step in to support Richard, the Home Office has just further discredited our rotten extradition system and itself.”
Britain has an extradition treaty with Turkey under the 1957 Council of Europe Convention on Extradition, honoured under part two of the 2003 Extradition Act.
Mark Spragg, the solicitor for the ‘NatWest Three’ bankers who unsuccessfully fought extradition from the UK to the US in 2006, said a court should decide if the Duchess of York should be extradited.
Mr Spragg said: “I do not understand why the Duchess of York should not be considered for extradition upon a request from Turkey.
“If a request is made, then it is for the court here to decide if the offence she is accused of there is also an offence here and which attracts a sentence of more than 12 months in prison.
“On the basis of the strange decision last week in the O’Dwyer case it seems that even that may not now be a bar to extradition.”
The Duchess, 52, is said to be “stressed” by the allegations. If convicted, she would face a maximum sentence of 22 years in jail.
She has put foreign travel plans on hold in case she went to a country which decided to honour the request from Turkey. A trip to the US was cancelled at the weekend.
The news came as a leading Turkish opposition politician has rallied in support of the Duchess of York, Sarah Ferguson after Turkey’s Chief Prosecutor called for her extradition for taking part in an undercover documentary.
Riza Turkmen, Deputy of the Republican People’s Party, said: “What’s the crime in regard to this action? It was better to do this. After that, the children’s condition of care improved. I don’t see any crime in it. Why the Chief Prosecutor insisted on this issue, I don’t understand.”
A Home Office spokesman said: “It is not our usual policy to comment on individual cases. However, the Home Office can confirm it has received a formal request for mutual legal assistance concerning Sarah, Duchess of York. It is not appropriate to comment further.”
via Theresa May accused of ‘double standards’ over Duchess of York extradition to Turkey – Telegraph.