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Bin Laden's right-hand man in Europe and the geek who hacked Pentagon computers to look at UFOs So who goes free? Richard Pendlebury In the pantheon of the American military's Most Wanted list, McKinnon must rank some way below Osama bin Laden. Yet while the Al Qaeda leader remains elusive, a vengeful Pentagon is inching ever closer to the capture and high-security imprisonment of an unemployed British hairdresser with a potentially disastrous interest in UFOs. By his own account, McKinnon, 42, was nothing more than a 'bumbling nerd'. You would, perhaps, better describe him as a reckless idiot. Even his supporters would agree he's been a fool.
(Article continues below) Still, using a keyboard in his North London bedroom, he managed to infiltrate, examine and, allegedly, sometimes crash parts of the American military computer network - before and shortly after the September 11 Twin Towers attacks in New York. His efforts have been described as the 'biggest military computer hack of all time'. Since then, the deeply embarrassed and enraged U.S. authorities have determined that their British pothead nemesis should pay a heavy price. There has even been the suggestion - from one rather excitable New Jersey attorney - that in an ideal world they would like to see him 'fry'. Earlier this week, the gaunt and well-spoken McKinnon appeared before the House of Lords to make what is likely to be a last, desperate appeal against extradition to the U.S. If he loses, he faces up to 60 years in jail there. Despite diplomatic assurances, he also fears he faces a spell in an orange jumpsuit in Guantanamo Bay. From the sounds some American prosecutors are making, he has every reason to be afraid.
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