Bankers stand trial shock
A marvellous, brilliant post on his blog by Stephen Pollard, about the three chaps from Natwest who are being extradited to the US in order to face fraud charges:
And, er, that’s it. That’s the huge injustice that they are facing. A trial, where the evidence will be weighed, and a jury will decide. When a trial takes place here we call it justice. When it takes place in the US we call it an outrage.
The British authorities don’t want to try them, the cry has gone out, so they should be left alone. Well, maybe, just maybe, that’s because the US is far tougher on white-collar crime than we are.
But they’ll await trial alongside murderers and rapists! Indeed. That’s what happens when you’re locked up. It’s not meant to be pleasant.
Most stupidly of all, we are told that we shouldn’t extradite them to the US because they didn’t extradite IRA suspects to us. Genius. Explain, please, how the best response is allowing other indicted defendants to escape trial, too?
None of the fuss has anything to do with justice. It’s merely the latest manifestation of the British establishment’s default mode: sneering superiority towards those awful hick Americans. And it’s as nauseating as usual.
It does seem strange. If these men have not done anything wrong, why not stand trial in America? It's good that America takes more of a stand over corporate crime. Pity the same doesn't happen over here.
-posted by Roy
