Wednesday 11 April 2012

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Will Kim Dotcom be extradited to the United States?

New Zealand’s online predictions market, iPredict, has launched a new stock asking whether or not Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom will be extradited to the United States before 2014 to face racketeering, money laundering and copyright charges.

iPredict’s 6000 registered traders, plus anyone else who signs up for free at https://www.ipredict.co.nz/app.php?do=register, can now trade in the stock at https://www.ipredict.co.nz/app.php?do=contract_detail&contract=DOTCOM.EXT.JAN14.

Each stock will pay NZ$1 if, before 1 January 2014, the New Zealand courts rule finally and definitively that Mr Dotcom, previously known as Kim Schmitz, is to be extradited to the United States, otherwise it will pay NZ$0. Under the theory of the Wisdom of Crowds, the price in cents at any given time will indicate the probability that the New Zealand courts will rule to extradite Mr Dotcom by 1 January 2014.

Mr Dotcom and colleagues were arrested on 20 January 2012 by New Zealand Police, following an armed raid on his mansion in Coatesville near Auckland, New Zealand. New Zealand authorities were said to have co-operated in the investigation preceding the arrests with the United States' FBI and Justice Department, Hong Kong Customs and the Hong Kong Department of Justice, the Netherlands Police Agency and the Public Prosecutor's Office for Serious Fraud and Environmental Crime in Rotterdam, London's Metropolitan Police Service, Germany’s Bundeskriminalamt and the German Public Prosecutors, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Canadian Department of Justice, and the extradition request is reported to have been signed by US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton.

The United States Government filed its extradition case against Mr Dotcom on Friday 2 March 2012 at the North Shore District Court, which released him on bail on Wednesday 22 February. The hearing at the District Court is expected to begin in August. There are three layers of appeal court above the District Court in New Zealand: the High Court, the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court. Mr Dotcom is represented by Paul Davison QC, arguably New Zealand’s top criminal defence lawyer with a reputation for taking on and winning seemingly impossible cases.

iPredict is owned by Victoria University of Wellington.

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