Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith signs Kim Dotcom’s extradition order

Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith has signed Kim Dotcom’s extradition order, meaning New Zealand will almost certainly deport him to the United States.

German-born Dotcom moved to New Zealand in 2010. He has been facing potential extradition since 2012 when he was arrested as part of a global sting. The US Justice Department pressed charges against Dotcom, including criminal copyright infringement, money laundering, racketeering and wire fraud.

Dotcom made his fortune from Megaupload, a file-sharing website often used to share pirated movies and music. He was pursued by US authorities who argued that the company profited from the intellectual property of others, which was uploaded to the site.

Goldsmith said he had “received extensive advice from the Ministry of Justice on this matter”.

“I considered all of the information carefully, and have decided that Mr Dotcom should be surrendered to the US to face trial,” he said.

“As is common practice, I have allowed Mr Dotcom a short period of time to consider and take advice on my decision. I will not, therefore, be commenting further at this stage,” he said.

Dotcom appeared to reveal the fact of his own extradition in a long post to X, formerly Twitter, sent on August 13.

Amidst talk of World War 3 and the “fake ‘rules-based order’”, Dotcom said that an “obedient US colony in the South Pacific [New Zealand] just decided to extradite me for what users uploaded to Megaupload”.

He maintained that he had no control of what Megaupload’s users decided to upload on the website and that copyright holders “were able to remove with direct delete access instantly and without question”.

Although significant, the signing of the extradition warrant is just another step in a process that is likely to take years longer.

Dotcom has always signalled seeking a judicial review of the extradition warrant, and to appeal any adverse outcome. If extradition goes ahead, it could be years from now.

In June, MBIE said former Megaupload executives Mathias Ortmann and Bram van der Kolk had been prohibited from managing or directing any companies for five years - a standard sanction for those convicted of dishonesty offences.

In June 2022, Ortmann and van der Kolk broke with Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom and pleaded guilty to money laundering, racketeering and copyright infringement.

In a plea deal, the United States dropped its bid to extradite the pair, who would instead plead guilty in a New Zealand court to being part of a criminal group and causing loss by deception for their involvement in the illegal reproduction and distribution of copyrighted works.

In June 2023, Ortmann was sentenced to two years and seven months in prison and van der Kolk to two years and six months.

The fourth accused, Finn Batato, had US charges against him dropped in 2021 after he developed terminal cancer. He died in June 2022.

Dotcom has been a feature of New Zealand public life almost since he arrived.

In 2012, his rented house, dubbed the “Dotcom Mansion” was raided by the Police Special Tactics Group as part of a worldwide FBI operation to take down Dotcom’s Megaupload file-sharing website which was claimed to be at the centre of a massive criminal copyright operation.

Dotcom and three others were arrested, but Dotcom was later given a settlement after he filed a damaged claim with the High Court over what was considered an “unreasonable” use of force.

In 2014, he funded the Internet party which later moved with Hone Harawira’s Mana party to form Internet-Mana. It contested the 2014 election, but despite considerable financial backing from Dotcom, failed to win more than 5% of the vote to enter Parliament. Harawira lost his seat in the election. Dotcom later said his own involvement with the party had “poisoned” its brand.