Why not apply the extradition treaty provisions?
One of the federal review agencies told me recently that sometimes public servants confuse policy with the law, the notorious example being Robodebt.
In Dan Duggan’s case, the law is contained in the Australia-US extradition treaty. Firstly this specifies a range of extraditable offences, none of which apply to Dan. Then it provides for extradition if Australian law has a similar offence to the alleged US offence. At the time of the alleged offences, we had no offences matching the two directly pilot-training related offences.
However, as to alleged money laundering, we do have a cognate offence. But US federal law has a statute of limitations of five years for money laundering. See 18 USC 3282(a). So if for example any alleged laundering was in 2012, charges brought after 2017 would be invalid.
Presumably the Attorney General’s department knows all this, yet it continues to imprison Dan in maximum security, until a judge at a suitable level hears the case. Dan, an Australian citizen, in the meantime is unable to support or live with his young family, and faces heavy legal expenses. So I expect federal public servants to be able to recommend that the AG applies the law correctly.
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