“I sincerely hope that no personal information was stolen to the point that any of the senders or recipients have their personal security or wealth compromised. While we all know that emails are not incredibly secure, the stories of identity theft are countless. It would be a travesty if this crime caused personal harm to any involved. Some of these emails reveal personal information and information about family members so this is a serious issue.”

I to wish no harm on these scientists families,However if…and it appears quite likely from quotes I’ve read….these people manipulated the truth and hid evidence to support a theory that has cost money, time, conveniences and loss of freedoms for most all people on earth while making a great living, I would be happy to see them loose their wealth and spend a good deal of time in a very insecure place called prison.

Their are many lesser criminals in such places now.

I amend my stance to be that IF any laws were broken then the full power of the law should be applied to them.

Regarding your first statement. I know for sure that would be a major violation of laws. UK is a signatory of several treaties that would enforce one or more laws if a foreign person would access the server without specific permission and remove files without specific permission. Also, as I understand it, the whistleblower statutes would not be in affect in this case as the whistleblower doesn’t cover foreign acts nor does it cover moving files out of the territory of the UK. The person may not be guilty of a law in Russia (or Iraq/Kuwait/Venezuala/etc.) but would surely be breaking UK laws.

1. It depends on the location of the hacker. They may well be operating under a set of laws where it is not illegal.

2. How do you know they were hacked? One of the CRU workers may well have walked out with them on a memory stick.

There are as many assumptions in the allegations of illegality as there are assumptions in the research

“He’s guilty, but with a really good excuse.”

As a practical matter, this is an unimportant distinction, but if UK law is the same as US law, then it has relevance to the disagreement between Nick and the Admin–they may both be right.

I am not nearly as well versed in UK laws as you appear to be. I will defer to you.

* a criminal offence;
* the breach of a legal obligation;
* a miscarriage of justice;
* a danger to the health and safety of any individual;
* damage to the environment; or
* deliberate covering up of information tending to show any of the above.

Destroying data subject to an FOI request in the UK is a criminal offence. Since the emails state they would rather destroy and may well have done, data subject to the request, the whistleblower is protected.

In reality, there is a further test. The CPS (Crown prosecution service) has to assess whether or not there is a realistic chance of a prosecution. It wouldn’t win, in particular post the Expenses scandal in the UK. Here MPs have been committing fraud on mass. A whistleblower leaked the information on the scams to the Telegraph newspaper. No prosecution took place in that case.

Nick

I will moderate my post and simply say that if laws were broken then the perpetrator(s) should be punished to the fullest extent of the law.

1. The CRU has been funded with millions of taxpayer’s money. Doing that on the basis of false results is fraud.

2. We have to pay the bill for AGW and its ‘mitigation’. If AGW doesn’t exist, then the taxpayer is out by trillions. That’s fraud too.

So if the emails show illegal activity, the person who has leaked or hacked has a defense.

Now destroying data subject to an FOI request is a criminal offence. Even if you don’t do it, discussing it with others is conspiracy, and that is a criminal offence in the UK.

Threatening to beat people up in the UK is a criminal offence.

So its pretty likely whoever took them or leaked them hasn’t broken the law. Plus you are unlikely to get a conviction in the wake of MP’s expenses where a similar scenario took place.