As the testimony of former Enron CEO Jeff Skilling concludes today in a Houston courtroom, a political firestorm is brewing in the United Kingdom over the Enron-related case of the NatWest Three (previous posts here) — the three former London-based National Westminster Bank PLC bankers who are charged in Houston with bilking their former employer of $7.3 million in one of the schemes allegedly engineered by former Enron CFO Andrew Fastow and his right hand man, Michael Kopper.
According to this article from The Scotsman, an influential committee of the Scottish Parliament has taken the extraordinary step of writing to the UK government to lodge a formal complaint requesting that Scotland be exempted from the provisions of the 2003 Extradition Treaty signed with the US in the wake of the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington, D.C.
According to The Scotsman article, the committee has notified the UK government that it is objects to Scots being taken to the US to stand trial for offenses without the US being required first to present a prima facie case against the Scots in a UK court. The committee also objects to other terms of the controversial treaty, such as allowing UK citizens to be extradited to the US for one offense and charged with another and giving US the power to demand the extradition of British citizens to face trial in the US even though the US Congress has not approved the treaty allowing the British government similar extradition rights with regard to US citizens. One of the NatWest Three — Gary Mulgrew — is a Scot and the son of a member of the Scottish Parliament.
Inasmuch as it is highly unlikely that the UK government would exempt Scotland from a major international treaty, the Scottish committee’s complaint is largely symbolic. But it is adding to growing political pressure in the UK for the UK government to disavow the extradition treaty, which went into effect in January 2004 as an anti-terrorist measure. The treaty has resulted in 12 extraditions to date, but none of them have been for terrorist offenses. Two were extradited for alleged drug offenses, six for alleged fraud or robbery, one on murder allegations, two for alleged rape and one for an alleged assault. 23 other alleged white-collar criminals — many of whom work in London’s financial district — are currently awaiting extradition on allegations of fraud and other financial offenses.
Meanwhile, the London Daily Telegraph has established this handy webpage that includes articles, editorials and other resources relating to the controversy.
Thus, if the NatWest Three lose their current appeal to the House of Lords and are extradited to Houston, they will be forced to prepare the defense of their case against the imposing resources of the Enron Task Force while imprisoned in Houston’s Federal Detention Facility. Meanwhile, their main accusers — Fastow and Kopper — remain living comfortably in River Oaks and Montrose.
But an equally damaging aspect of the the case is the way that it portrays the US justice system in the UK and internationally as a wild frontier with no respect for due process of law. That portrayal is a natural product of the criminalization of business mindset that elevates propaganda campaigns and prosecutorial misconduct over proof of criminal charges in a court of law. Little wonder that the already high price of asserting innocence in the US justice system continues to increase.