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Comment by fragmede | Hacker News Reader

Interestingly, according to that article, he hasn't been charged with treason, 'just' espionage, theft and conversion of government property. Someone more qualified than I can elaborate, but treason is a much harder crime to prove than espionage (like murder vs. manslaughter).

Edit: According to the video link provided by spdy, the crime needs to exist in both systems (ie Hong Kong and the US) in order for an extradition request to be considered valid.

Treason, with a similar burden of proof, does not exist in Hong Kong, and thus could not be charged.

Is the US attorney's office allowed to rescind the charges of espionage and re-charge him with treason after he's been extradited to the US?

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The people using the term "treason" are either using it ridiculously or only to characterize their opinions of his actions.

From the Constitution:

> Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court. The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.

Treason doesn't exist in Hong Kong's basic law.

http://edition.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/bestoftv/2013/06... around 2:20 he talkes about this

taken from a reply by daywalker

"The Cold War period saw few prosecutions for treason. On October 11, 2006, a federal grand jury issued the first indictment for treason against the United States since Kawakita v. United States in 1952, charging Adam Yahiye Gadahn for videos in which he appeared as a spokesman for al-Qaeda and threatened attacks on American soil." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treason#United_States).

Can you imagine a jury of 12 all believing that what he did was not in the interests of his country?

Sadly that's not how your legal system works any more. I don't have the link handy but it came up here recently with that environmental activist who just got out of jail for breaking up an illegal auction of land. He thought he'd be fine but when the prosecution found that many of the jurors had received a juror's rights pamphlet out lining the basic foundations of your country like that jurys are supposed to be a social check on the laws and the social conscience they threw a fit and they with the judge 1 by 1 interviewed potential jury members and sent home anyone who wouldn't agree to follow the judges orders and interpretations of the law and just vote to convict on weather or not he broke the law, not weather the law was just or what he did was for a greater good.

And so with a jury stacked against him (some may say against the original spirit of your legal system) he ended up with years in jail. Mean while in the course of trying to redo the auction they of course found that it was illegal and didn't do it.

So he felt he'd saved the land and it was worth a few years of his life.

Snowden faces worse and again probably a fairly stacked jury if it were to ever come to that. Tho they could also just indefinitely detain him nakedly in a micro cell in solitary etc etc etc.

I think you're talking about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification

This used to go by another name: it was called a jury.

Do you know where one can find an online copy of those jury's rights pamphlets?

This is why people shouldn't skip on jury duty and why it is as important as voting.

Yes, quite easily. Randomly pull from somewhere like central Pennsylvania and you probably wouldn't even need to exclude anyone from your randomly picked list.

Yes, I can imagine it.

Yes. Have you not been to America?

When Clinton was President, yes. I guess times may have changed.

That would depend on the definition of "country" used (its leadership/government or its citizens), and whether or not the jury can be convinced that the secrecy of the leaked programs was in the citizenry's best interests.

To be fair, what he did could be in the interests of his country and still be considered espionage, depending on the details of the case. I think a very likely opinion would be, yes, the programs he exposed were wrong and yes, he's a hero but also a traitor.

I only say this because I expect the bulk of comments to this post to suggest the reason Americans might find him guilty would be narrow-mindedness or some sort of fascist tendency, but that's not necessarily going to be the case even if they do. Anti China/Anti-communist bias definitely would play a part, but the charges could possibly stick on their own merits, even if Americans are uncomfortable with the nature of what he exposed.

Yes. Very easily. I suspect that well over half of jury-eligible people would consider him a traitor.

Right, I think it would have been supremely hard to get him for treason.

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