McKinnon's mum to stand for parliament against Straw

In a new twist to the long-running saga of NASA hacker Gary McKinnon's struggle to resist extradition to the United States, his mother Janis Sharp has decided to stand at the general election against justice secretary Jack Straw.

According to a new post on the Free Gary blog, Sharp will be contesting the safe Labour seat of Blackburn, despite Straw being the only former home secretary who has not had to deal with the Gary McKinnon extradition case.

However, he was foreign secretary at the time the UK held "secret extradition treaty negotiations" with the US Government resulting in the Extradition Act 2003.

"He is personally at least as much to blame for the ongoing legal travesty and betrayal of British sovereignty as any of his Labour government colleagues," noted the blog.

"The fact that the Gary McKinnon extradition case has exceeded the lifetime of this current parliament is a scandal which belies any promises of swift or fair justice made by this Labour government."

McKinnon is currently awaiting a second judicial review of whether current home secretary Alan Johnson was right not to stand in the way of the original decision to ship him off to the US.

12 Apr 2010