ECHR halts extradition of Latvian hacker to US

The European Court for Human Rights (ECHR) halted the Latvian government’s decision to extradite Latvian citizen Denis Calovskis to the United States. The US authorities accuse him of creating and spreading a virus that affected over one million computers across the world, Calovskis’s attorney Saulvedis Varpins told reporters on Thursday that the European Court of Human Rights accepted as a priority matter the appeal of the Latvian cyber crime suspect’s defense. The ECHR replied that Calovskis was not to be extradited until his case was heard in the Strasbourg Court. Latvian Justice Minister Janis Bordans told the local LNT television channel on Thursday that Calovskis was under custody on Latvian territory at the moment and, in accordance with the Latvian court’s decision, would be extradited to the US for trial as soon as related documents were provided by the United States. In late January 2013 the Latvian Supreme Court permitted Calovskis’s extradition to the US. The court ruling is not subject to appeal. The Latvian government made on Tuesday the final decision on Calovskis’s extradition. Three persons are implicated in the case - Russian citizen Nikita Kuzmin, Riga resident Calovskis and Romanian citizen Mihai Paunescu. The US authorities assert that using the computer virus the accused got illegal access to bank information and were stealing money from accounts of natural and legal persons and government institutions. Investigation established that their actions caused the damage of at least 50 million dollars and affected 160 computers of the US space agency NASA.