US Justice and Dotcom’s birthday

Written By: - Date published: 1:20 am, October 15th, 2012 - 9 comments
Categories: john key, Judith Collins, Spying, us politics - Tags:

Judith Collins is going to the US and isn’t going to raise the Dotcom case we are told. I’ll bet the US Justice Department is though.

Read this snippet from the Hollywood Reporter interviewing Senator Dodd, who raised the issue with John Key when he was in Hollywood “in passing” – yeah right.

THR: Just as SOPA was falling apart, U.S. and New Zealand authorities arrested Kim Dotcom, the flamboyant mastermind behind Megaupload, one of the world’s biggest downloading sites. Did the timing strike you as odd?

Dodd: It seemed a little too coincidental. I take my daughters to school every morning, and I was in the playground one day and this woman comes up to me and says: “I just want to say hello. I work at the Justice Department, and I’ve been involved in this Megaupload case for the past several years.” And I said: “That’s interesting. Let me ask you something: Why did this guy get arrested at this particular time?” She said: “Oh, we’ve known about the date for the last year because it was his birthday. It was a big party, and we knew all the assets would be there.”

So the US Justice Department has been working on the Dotcom case for several years, and had known for a year that the day to arrest Dotcom would be his birthday. Who told them? – presumably GCSB. They certainly told Grant Wormald of New Zealand Police that that would be the day to do it, as reported at the time in the Herald.

Detective Inspector Grant Wormald, of the Organised & Financial Crime Agency New Zealand, said the planning of the raid was timed around Dotcom’s 38th birthday celebrations, intended for yesterday.

“Intelligence had told us that when he has a birthday party most of the people who were indicted (in the US) would be at his party.”

So it looks as though GCSB had been working with the US authorities for over a year, monitoring Dotcom’s activities.This is a big issue for the US, make no bones about it.

I don’t think Key was in Hollywood in search of New Zealand jobs. I think he was summoned to explain why New Zealand was making such a botch up of what the US wants. Now he’s in the gun, Judith gets the call to see if she can sort it for them?

9 comments on “US Justice and Dotcom’s birthday ”

  • Comments are now closed

  1. Glg 1
    15 October 2012 at 6:35 am

    So he wasn’t over there to confirm his new US citizenship then?

    • ianmac 1.1
      15 October 2012 at 10:07 am

      He came back looking a bit down because he had just found out that USA do not hand out knighthoods.

  2. starlight 2
    15 October 2012 at 11:26 am

    Perhaps it was known in govt by ministers there was going to be a raid on dotcom,
    simon power had previously turned dotcom’s residency down,but who was it that
    approved it,simon power, a lawyer, would have known what was happening and
    didn’t want to be involved,so he resigned on 2/3/11 to take affect on 11/11,the
    raid happened 20/1/12,another puzzle to the dotcom saga.

    • Murray Olsen 2.1
      15 October 2012 at 1:54 pm

      I’m wondering if DotCom was finally given residence at the request of the seppos so they would know he was living in a compliant state that would do the spying and arresting on their behalf.

    • Katy 2.2
      15 October 2012 at 4:14 pm

      Not forgetting that prior to the Dotcom raid New Zealand was involved as a signatory to the Anti-Counterfeiting – Trade- Agreement, (ACTA) along with the Americans. Also that this international agreement was based along the same lines as the American SOPA act that involved internet piracy and raised concerns due to its secrecy, not only in New Zealand but worldwide.

      http://www.mfat.govt.nz/Trade-and-Economic-Relations/2-Trade-Relationships-and-Agreements/Anti-Counterfeiting/index.php

      http://www.nzherald.co.nz/technology/news/article.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10638108

      So it would seem logical to assume that the New Zealand Government would have had prior knowledge of organisations that could have been suspected of copy right infringement,a long time before the raid. Seeing that 3 ministers of the crown were negotiating the ACTA agreement, (Minister of Commerce, Simon Power, Minister of Trade, Tim Groser, and Minister of Trade, Maurice Williamson). One does wonder if when Simon Power declined Kim Dotcoms application to purchase land in New Zealand he took into account other information that was available to him from his involvement with ACTA before failing him on the good character test in September 2011.

      http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10750824

      If that was the case where did that information come from, FBI? GCSB? Or some other agency?

  3. tracey 3
    15 October 2012 at 11:58 am

    Surely the most obvious thing here is no one asked immigration what his status was and implications at law. This alone suggests mock ignorance.

    • starlight 3.1
      15 October 2012 at 12:08 pm

      I would say it was well known within govt agencies,but they didn’t care the US was
      the master,also the gcsb could just stop all of the information from comming out,as
      english did and signed an order to keep everything secret,it was wormald that bought
      the secrets out into the open while in court being questioned and now the ball is rolling
      on and on and gathering more information.

  4. tracey 4
    15 October 2012 at 12:08 pm

    Perhaps he had a prid quo pro with the us if it unravelled andcthey have renegged

  5. muzza 5
    15 October 2012 at 1:07 pm

    Hollywood – Writing/controlling the scripts for more than movies/tv, for a very long time!

The server will be getting hardware changes this evening starting at 10pm NZDT.
The site will be off line for some hours.