A New Zealand official signs an extradition order to send Kim Dotcom to the US

Kim Dotcom has lost another decision in his bid to avoid extradition from New Zealand to the United States, more than a dozen years after file-sharing site Megaupload was shut down. But he has not yet run out of appeal options.

On Thursday, a government spokesman confirmed that New Zealand Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith had signed an extradition warrant for Dotcom, according to Reuters.

“I have received extensive advice from the Ministry of Justice on this matter,” Goldsmith said in a statement cited by numerous news organizations. “I have carefully considered all the information and have decided that Mr. Dotcom should be extradited to the United States to stand trial. As is standard practice, I have given Mr. Dotcom a short period of time to consider and receive advice on the my decision. Therefore, I will not comment further at this stage.”

The latest extradition decision, like the previous ones, is not final. dotcom he said this week that will run. “By the time the calls are made, if ever, the world will be a very different place,” he wrote.

“I love New Zealand. I'm not leaving,” too published today

A New Zealand Herald article said today that Dotcom's expected appeal could drag out the case for several more years. “If the extradition goes ahead, it could be years,” the newspaper wrote.

Dotcom attacks the 'obedient US colony'

dotcom shattered the New Zealand government, writing that “the obedient US colony in the South Pacific has just decided to extradite me for what users uploaded to Megaupload, unsolicited, and what copyright holders were able to delete with direct delete access instantly and without a doubt.”

Megaupload was to close by US authorities in January 2012. Dotcom and others were accused on charges of conspiracy to commit racketeering, conspiracy to commit money laundering, conspiracy to commit copyright infringement, criminal copyright infringement, aiding and abetting criminal copyright infringement, and electronic fraud

Dotcom has been able to delay extradition despite numerous rulings against him. A judge from New Zealand orderly Dotcom's extradition in December 2015. The extradition order was maintained in 2017 by an appellate court and again in 2018 by another court of appeal.

The Supreme Court of New Zealand ruled against Dotcom and two other defendantsMathias Ortmann and Bram van der Kolk, December 2021. Ortmann and van der Kolk reached a deal that allowed them to “avoid extradition to the US in exchange for facing charges in New Zealand,” a Associated press article in May 2022 he said.

The AP article said that despite the Supreme Court ruling against the three Megaupload defendants, the extradition still needed the approval of the Justice Minister. “And even that decision could be appealed,” AP wrote.

After the 2021 Supreme Court ruling, things mentioned Victoria University law professor Geoff McLay said a judicial review of an extradition decision by the justice minister would likely involve hearings before New Zealand's High Court, the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court. If the justice minister “makes a decision that they should be extradited, I would imagine they would immediately judicially review their decision, which will start the whole shebang again,” McLay said at the time.

In a May 2022 podcastNew Zealand Herald investigative reporter David Fisher said: “I think there's a good chance we'll have another three to five years of court wrangling through this case. It's possible the Minister for Justice will sign the 'extradition order, but then it will be appealed to the High Court through judicial review, then it will go to the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court. And when you get to a point of three or five years in the way in which Dotcom's health may be that the American system is not able to deal with, and this could be a good new reason to bounce extradition.”