Autonomy's Mike Lynch gets yet another judgment date as US extradition wrangling continues Mike Lynch will have to wait a week to find out if he can have his extradition from the UK to America kicked into the long grass – while the High Court in England has set itself yet another deadline for its epically long judgment on the HP/Autonomy merger. These were the only two substantial snippets to emerge from Tuesday's …
That's fine, but it completely misses the point. Blame Mr Justice Hildyard, first and foremost, for dragging his feet. If he had done his job, the extradition case would also be long settled and Mr Lynch would by now either be putting all this behind him or actively standing trial in the United States. Surely either would be preferable to the current situation, which at best will not be ended for months and may well consume several more years of his life. Suppose his motion were granted and the deadline were extended yet again; does anything prevent Mr Justice Hildyard from delaying another 6 months, and another, and another? Does anything even require him *ever* to produce a decision? Would everyone not be right back in the same courts making the same arguments yet again with each subsequent delay? The parent poster's point, I believe, which I agree with wholeheartedly, is that there seems to be no end to this and that is cruel regardless of the outcome. I can't convince myself that the blame for that rests with anyone else. Justice delayed is justice denied.
Who is responsible for that? He is telling his lawyers to exercise every possible avenue of appeal to drag things on. The more attempts his lawyers make to get him out of it, the more there is that require judges to rule on - and it isn't like they are submitting one page briefs that are easy to understand and decide on.
You might as well complain that poor old Donald Trump is being denied swift justice in congress' attempts to get access to his tax returns. After five years and countless delays and appeals from Trump's lawyers, congress still haven't got them despite a very clear law (whether one agrees with the law or not) saying they are entitled to them.
Most of the time is the general public that are hurt by endless delays, because if rich people who are able to spend unlimited money on lawyers like Lynch or Trump can drag things out for the remainder of their life, they win and we lose since they have access to a different justice system than the rest of us.
That is the punishment.
The US govt really doesn't care about the outcome of any of it. The process itself ruins a huge chunk of your life and wealth.
And generally when they are dealing with the super rich, the odds of them being sentenced to anything appropriate to the crimes is pretty slender*, so an interminable and ruinous process is all the govt really has to threaten them with.
* A lot better when you can drag a foreigner into your own courts, I'd wager.
(Especially when you look like a lesser bridge troll. Anyone want to take my odds on Lynch or Fat Bastard getting a lighter sentence than Liz Holmes?)
"Summers said the lower court was bang on the money and justice (the extradition, in this case) had waited long enough to be done."
I agree completely. It seems any court case of significance grinds on for years with decades of appeals when if there were justice involved, it should take months to obtain redress.
The court system is bound by the presumption of innocence with an obligation to prove a case beyond reasonable doubt. This is why things can grind on for years. Oh, and siding with a lower court against the High Court is rarely a good idea.
There is also nothing stopping the US court from trying the case in absentia, this happens often enough.
seems to be the pattern for Autonomy related cases.
Jarndyce and Jarndyce drones on. This scarecrow of a suit has, over the course of time, become so complicated, that no man alive knows what it means. The parties to it understand it least; but it has been observed that no two Chancery lawyers can talk about it for five minutes without coming to a total disagreement as to all the premises. Innumerable children have been born into the cause; innumerable young people have married into it; innumerable old people have died out of it. Scores of persons have deliriously found themselves made parties in Jarndyce and Jarndyce without knowing how or why; whole families have inherited legendary hatreds with the suit. The little plaintiff or defendant, who was promised a new rocking-horse when Jarndyce and Jarndyce should be settled, has grown up, possessed himself of a real horse, and trotted away into the other world. Fair wards of court have faded into mothers and grandmothers; a long procession of Chancellors has come in and gone out.
About time we got a judgement in the civil case, not sure I'll be able to sustain the popcorn eating for 1500 pages though but I'm sure El Reg will give us a nice concise summary.
At a certain point though we're going to see the lawyers fees dwarf everything (if we haven't reached that point already) that HP are claiming they lost.
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