Legislation against terrorists, put through since 11 September, would soon be put to other repressive uses, critics said. It was, they argued, the thin end of the wedge. The cases of three NatWest bankers who face extradition to America over their alleged involvement in the Enron scandal suggest we are already making our way towards the thicker end.
David Bermingham, Gary Mulgrew and Giles Darby are accused of conspiring with two senior members of the US accountancy firm Enron to defraud NatWest of $7m. They are UK citizens, whose crimes are alleged to have taken place in the UK against a UK bank. But US prosecutors want them to stand trial in Houston, Texas.
Under a 2004 Act, the extraordinary implications of which were first highlighted by NS in June 2003, the US can demand their extradition without presenting a prima facie case to a UK court. As Sanjay Bhandari, a London lawyer writing in Legal Week, predicted when the law was going through parliament, it enables "the US courts to extend long-arm jurisdiction over individuals in the UK". But Britain has no reciprocal rights to demand the extradition of US citizens, because it would not be allowed under the US constitution.
The only answer for the Enron Three, as they have become known, is to get themselves prosecuted in the UK. That is why they are seeking judicial review of the Serious Fraud Office's decision not to prosecute them. The SFO, in true Kafkaesque style, initially defended its decision, on the grounds that proceedings against the three were already under way in the US.
But isn't the US is a liberal democracy where suspects will receive a fair trial? Maybe, but the suspects will have to wait up to two years there before their case comes to trial. Moreover, the sessions will take place in Enron's home town of Houston where, the men argue, they are unlikely to receive a fair hearing. And their alleged crimes are punishable with far higher sentences in the US than here. Perhaps most important, the US, unlike the European countries with which Britain has extradition agreements, is not a signatory to the Convention on Human Rights.
Given the law steered through by his predecessor, there is nothing Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, can do. Like Oliver Hardy, he can only bellow, as though David Blunkett were the head-scratching Stan Laurel: "That's another fine mess you've gotten me into!" For the Enron Three, it is no laughing matter.
