n an opinion piece entitled ‘The Tentacles of Extradition’ (, 26 October 2012), the legal reaction to Griffiths’ extradition on copyright charges is described:
In 2007 former NSW Chief Judge in Equity, Justice Peter Young, highlighted in the Australian Law Journal ‘the bizarre fact that people are being extradited to the US to face criminal charges when they have never been to the US and the alleged act occurred wholly outside the US.’
… Justice Young pointed out at the time that ‘although International copyright violations are a great problem … there is also the consideration that a country must protect its nationals from being removed from their homeland to a foreign country merely because the commercial interests of that foreign country are claimed to have been affected by the person’s behaviour in Australia and the foreign country can exercise influence over Australia … Assuming this decision is correct, should not the Commonwealth Parliament do more to protect Australians from this procedure?’
How might the judge’s question be answered? How should the protection of copyright be balanced against other legal interests?
