File-sharer’s Extradition Case is Over

The 24-year-old UK student Richard O’Dwyer has welcomed the end of an American court case following charges over copyright violation. Richard was threatened with a jail sentence in the United States after launching the TVShack site which provided its members with links to pirated movies and other content. O’Dwyer has now had charges dropped, but he was ordered by the court to pay a £20,000 fine.

The student said he was happy that the lawsuit had now drawn to an end, but pointed out that he wished the British government had prevented the legal proceedings from going that far. O’Dwyer announced he was very happy that the case was finally over with, and claimed that he still believed he had never committed any crime. The student appreciated that the United States has decided to drop the case against him.


Julia O’Dwyer, Richard’s mother, has carried out a campaign to make her son’s case public. She also said that she wished the British government had stopped legal proceedings from getting to that stage. In fact, the student had faced a few years of prison time over TVShack portal. He was accused of profiting by more than $230,000 from providing links to copyright violating content. In November he agreed to voluntarily appear in a court of the United States to face charges.

In the meantime, another UK citizen, Gary McKinnon, was told he would remain in the United Kingdom following a 10-year battle against extradition to the United States after searching for evidence of aliens on classified US networks. UK Home Secretary Theresa May decided to block extradition after a lengthy appeal to keep him in the country on health grounds.

Nevertheless, there’s been fierce criticism over the extradition agreement which existed between the United Kingdom and the United States. MPs have criticized the arrangement that is considered unequal in allowing relatively easy extradition only to the United States, but not in the other direction.

According to consumer right groups, despite the positive conclusion of O’Dwyer case, it illustrates that there are underlying changes which need to be made in order to prevent similar instances occurring in future. They claim that the law needs to be changed, because this ruling can’t mean that others won’t face similar charges in future.