At some stage the new Government will need to decide if they should settle with Kim Dotcom
Another month, another legal win for Kim Dotcom.
This follows the Human Rights Review Tribunal win for Kim and they are warning signals before his case hits the Supreme Court.
Here’s the problem for the new Government. If Kim wins his case at the Supreme Court, he will sue NZ for damages.
How much will that be?
An eye watering $6.8billion…
Internet tycoon Kim Dotcom sues New Zealand for $6.8bn
An internet entrepreneur accused of masterminding one of the largest copyright infringements in history is suing the New Zealand government for $6.8bn in damages — equivalent to 3.5 per cent of the Pacific nation’s GDP — over the destruction of his business. Kim Dotcom, who is fighting extradition to the US, alleges Wellington unlawfully issued an arrest warrant in 2012 that resulted in him being on bail for six years. This act damaged his reputation, restricted him from leaving New Zealand and left him under the threat of extradition, according to court documents. Mr Dotcom, a 44-year old German-Finnish national, is seeking damages for lost profits from Megaupload, the file-sharing site that the US Federal Bureau of Investigation ordered shut down in 2012. He alleges the business, in which he owned a 68 per cent stake, would now be worth $10bn. “I cannot be expected to accept all the losses to myself and my family as a result of the action of the New Zealand government,” Mr Dotcom told the BBC.
…but there’s no way he would win right?
Well, it looks like he can win…
Harvard professor says Dotcom allegations lack merit
Dotcom’s extradition hearing is due to start next week and the latest legal twist in the case has been filed in court this week.In submissions put forward by Dotcom’s US lawyer Ira Rothken yesterday, Harvard Law Professor Lawrence Lessig said the United States allegations lacked merit.
Mr Rothken told Morning Report today that the legal team was very pleased to have someone of Professor Lessig’s status say that Dotcom committed no crime.
“We think that it’s not only beneficial for Kim Dotcom, but for internet users across the globe, who make use of technologies like cloud storage on a daily basis.”
The United States has been trying to extradite Mr Dotcom since January 2012, when he was arrested on copyright and money-laundering charges relating to the now-defunct Megaupload website.
Later that year Mr Dotcom was found to be the subject of illegal spying by the GCSB, after which an independent review of the bureau was ordered.
Mr Rothken said the case against Dotcom should have been thrown out before it was even filed.
“We think the United States should take a look at this and seriously re-evaluate their case.”
…but would our Supreme Court allow him to win?
I believe the Supreme Court will look at this illegal fiasco of a case and decide whether or not NZ legal sovereignty trumps American legal sovereignty.
Which way do you think the Supreme Court of NZ will go on that?
Does anyone seriously think for one second that the highest Court in NZ will shrug and agree to fucking American law trumping our own domestic law?
This case is now bigger than Dotcom, this is about legal sovereignty. The Executive of NZ was willing under John Key to bend over backwards for America, our Judiciary will refuse point blank to do that.
But surely you scream, as you start getting nervous, no Government in its right mind would have agreed to a risky prosecution without protecting us from a massive damages case right?
Oh dear wee sleepy hobbits, I got bad news for ya…
New twist in Kim Dotcom case
The managers of the nation’s finances were kept at arm’s length when the Kim Dotcom case required Kiwi taxpayers to underwrite a potential future legal suit from the internet entrepreneur, a new document shows.Instead, then-police commissioner Peter Marshall signed the “undertaking in respect to costs and damages” – the agreement which would allow Dotcom to sue New Zealand if it emerged the FBI case against him was unfair and unfounded.
It was the first time that the Crown was required to give an “undertaking” in a case where the property of someone facing charges was seized and was because the charges were brought by a foreign agency.
The need to provide an “undertaking of liability” emerged after police seized the tycoon’s cash and property without notice. The law required Dotcom have the chance to challenge the seizure and be given formal notice of his right to sue the Crown.
The need to provide an undertaking in March and April 2012 surprised the Crown and the Herald sought details of the debate and consideration over the risk to which NZ was exposed through the Official Information Act in July 2012. Treasury refused to supply the information sought so the Ombudsman was called on to investigate.
After three years of deliberation, Chief Ombudsman Dame Beverley Wakeham found there was a “public interest” which would be met by releasing a summary, which Treasury sent to the Herald this month.
The summary showed there were meetings “to discuss the case and how to inform ministers” were held Crown Law, police, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Justice and Treasury.
On March 22 2012 Finance minister Bill English was told he “did not have a role in approving or signing off this kind of undertaking”. Instead, it was the Commissioner of Police’s role under the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act.
While Mr English was kept briefed – including a briefing from Mr Marshall and Attorney General Chris Finlayson – there was no process established through which he was able to be formally involved in the undertaking.
Under the Public Finance Act, Mr English is responsible for matters which might impact on Crown accounts. Dotcom has claimed the loss of Megaupload cost him more than $2 billion although others have argued the impact is far less.
The summary provided to the Herald said there had been a review of the mutual legal assistance framework of which Treasury was a part. It “intended to use the forum to recommend the establishment of a consultation process and set out criteria for issuing undertakings”.
The requirement to give an undertaking to the court to meet any damages was a factor which put Sony off joining a civil case seeking to claim Dotcom’s assets, emailed hacked and released last year revealed. Sony’s top copyright lawyer, Aimee Wolfson, said it was “not at all unimaginable” Dotcom would avoid extradition or even successfully defend himself in the United States.
The studio is not a participant in a case in NZ courts with discussion in the emails showing potential exposure to a legal suit from Dotcom concerning executives.
The risk to which New Zealand is exposed was underscored by a legal opinion released today from Harvard University’s professor of law Lawrence Lessig, one of the world’s leading experts on copyright law. He said the FBI charges would not stand up in US courts and there was no basis in law for Dotcom to be extradited.
…that’s right sleepy hobbits, your blessed Sir John Key and Sir Bill English signed us all up for what will be the largest damages case in our history.
When Kim Dotcom wins his Supreme Court fight and sues NZ for $6.8billion in damages, where will all those National voters who mocked him and cheered John Key be then?
Where. Will. They. Be?
Could we strip Bill English and John Key of their Knighthoods if he sues us? They were the ones who green lighted this abortion and they were the ones who signed us up as a country for the damages. Surely costing us $6.8b would nullify any ‘good’ they did to get their Knighthoods?
As much as we might love watching National voters twitch in the wind, the reality is NZ has barely paid out $1.5b in damages to Māori for stealing most of the country off them, a progressive Government having to shell out over four times that amount to a German internet entrepreneur who was targeted by the previous Government is NOT an outcome any of us wants.
That’s why the new Government should be quietly meeting and settling this with Dotcom before it gets to the Supreme Court.
The truth is we could get smashed here because of fucking Key and English, we need to start rethinking this bullshit case before it burns us further.
Who knows how much effluence left MPs in particular have over crown law. They all study hard but it’s in no ones best interests to have this aired in a public court. Dotcom has battled hard to expose corrupt practices of the deep-state but we should be conscious of the war raging in cyber between “old money” and “new money.” The deepstate and establishment figures they hide behind would say something like, “we value sovereignty and national security” while the new money would say something like “we value your customer experience.” Either way bulshit. Non of them know what the hell the Internet is or where it’s going. We don’t even have the language to describe it properly.
Even a cursory look into any type of literature around the Internet throws up huge engineering challenges that haven’t been solved yet like script issues, storage issues, then you get people coming in who don’t really know what they’re talking about as if it’s a data storage issue you can just go to Bunnings and solve.
And I’d strongly suggest discontinuing sanctions against some of New Zealand’s top creators (Dotcom) and bargain him down to naturalised / nationalised position. And that’s about it really because the alternatives seem to be Huawei.
I am in favour of him winning the claim herte as he was illegallly raided with overkill as bad as Nicky Hagar was and it has left a bad taste in my mouth now sadly.
Kim.com was rightly attempting to get at the truth as to the corruption under the former Government and he was silienced by John Key and his illegal black ops mates who have left a dark cloud over us all so an openning of thios case would be a way to clear the bad air left by the national party wrongful actioms as they are so keen on carrying on doing still today.
They. Will. Be. Blaming. Kim. Dot.Com, just the way that They blame NZ Maori for the Treaty settlements, because that is the way which reactive minds work.
The sovereignty issue is fascinating – if that is what it hinges on. As far as I know the sovereignty of the NZ Crown is supreme, and a NZ court deciding that our sovereignty is over-ruled by some sort of American legal sovereignty could be treasonous – it could possibly require an unlikely Act of Parliament to achieve this sort of outcome.
In return, the Crown could seek to recoup their loss by suing whoever was responsible for the illegal raid on Kim Dot Com and the presumably illegal seizure of his assets. Hopefully those responsible have a bob or two to spare. 6 Billion. Whatever.
Honourable men might run on their swords.
Seizure of knighthoods ? Knighthoods are little more than a kindergarten elephant stamp on the hand, important only to the characters who hanker after them, and if either of these two gentlemen think that their knighthoods will ever admit them to the upper echelons of Brit, or any significant society, they may be dreaming; they admit them to the company of other people like themselves, which challenge rational analysis, but who knows.
Over the past years i.e since 2008; we had to listen to John Key making promises that even he had no intention on keeping once the votes were counted in his favour every election year(and time).
He assured us common NZers that we were not under surveillance by say the GCSB etc,etc,etc. But who knows in this day and age???!!!!!
John Key, being the self-serving so ‘n so that he still is, even promoted an old school friend that he hadn’t been in touch with for many years to the role of CEO of the GCSB. Now that shows favourtism especially when Key claimed he hadn’t been in touch with the old school chum for many years but happened to know his cell-phone number(Someone please tell me cellphones existed in the 60s because I don’t recall seeing them in those years???!!!)
I am sure many will disagree with me here but it’s still puzzles me to this day that Key so had it in for Kim Dotcom. Is Key’s vendetta and vindictive behaviour towards Kim Dotcom because of John Banks and the split cheques donations?
I mean Key was courting Banks for votes only and because both are National Party supporters when all things considered they would naturally attack anyone that stood in their own personal goals and ambitions.
One thing that also stands out is to this day there has not been even a peep of concern by Bill English in regards to the Kim Dotcom to John Banks donation wrangle. Perhaps because Bill English didn’t want to rock the political and NZ taxpayer funded showboat that he was enjoying free-loading on.
All in all the matter makes a mockery of the Knighthoods that both persons i.e Key and English; received whilst both were so busy disparaging ordinary NZers at every opportunity that it must surely disgust many and especially those who do alot of voluntary work and get little or no recognition for it????!!!!!
The knighthood appears to be given to Double Dippers, perpetual liars and freeloaders who never cared about anyone else but themselves when all things are considered.
The Queen handed Bush Jnr a knighthood for job well done in killing millions of innocents.
Says it all about value of a knighthood don’t ya think!
They hung one of my forebears in Scotland in the 1600’s lovely people ?
JK any relation to George Soros ?
JK…maybe not Soros but bnb with HM at Balmoral! Think about it.
Maybe I thought about it this week when HM’s picture boy Prince William was swanning around the Middle East with a preponderance of photo shots in Israel, to a constant chorus of this is not a political visit, this is not a political visit, this is not a political visit you fools.
[Comment declined for publication. Trolling and pointless. – Scarletmod]
$6.8bn? Chicken feed.
Key, English & cabal stumped near $2bn to South Canterbury Finance at the drop of a hat. Chump change.
$3bn per annum (minimum) – the amount of profit Aussie banks suck out of NZ. That’s annually, but who cares?
Less than $3bn – total reparations to Maori in Treaty of Waitangi settlements to date. We’ve gotten off lightly.
At individual level, that’s a fair amount of dosh – at corporate/government level they’re just numbers on paper.
Did we get the South Canterbury Finance money back ?
Personally I hope Kim Dotcom wins his case, collects the 6 Billion, and in thus doing reopens the whole corrupt John Key era.
No matter the immediate cost.
It would be worth it to expose the criminal we had as PM for 9 years and make New Zealanders seriously consider how easily they were indeed taken in by a political conman. And if that removes the smug , self gratifying self illusions we’ve had about ourselves and how self righteous the media have led us to believe we are then so be it.
Both England and the USA had long , bloody civil wars because of corrupt individuals in power .
We could be saving ourselves and future generations the same fate simply by recognizing a corrupt politician when we see one and taking the appropriate steps to avoid it ever happening again.
John Key was the litmus test for NZ’s gullibility. And we failed the test.
Kim Dotcom could in fact in future come to be one of NZ’s finest examples of an individual standing up to corruption in international high places and not only winning, – but setting colossally gross wrongs right.
I hope he stays in NZ.
Hes more than earned his place as a citizen.
It should be Kim Dotcom that receives a knighthood.
Not the scumbag shower pissing , pony tail puller form Wall Street.