Impending extradition to the USA: Kim Dotcom reports "severe stroke"
Kim has been fighting his extradition to the USA for years, and things have been looking less good recently. Now he reports on X that he has suffered a stroke.
Kim Dotcom on X
German internet entrepreneur Kim Dotcom has suffered a "severe stroke" according to his own account. He is undergoing treatment and hopes to be able to report back soon, the former operator of the Megaupload share host writes on the short message service X (formerly Twitter). Dotcom's lawyer Ira Rothken confirmed this to the news agency AP, but gave no further details. Dotcom lives in New Zealand and has been fighting for years against his impending extradition to the USA, which has accused him of massive copyright infringements and issued an arrest warrant for him. In August 2024, the New Zealand government announced Dotcom's extradition.
Multi-year fight against extradition
Dotcom was born Kim Schmitz in Kiel in 1974 and has lived in New Zealand since 2010. He had previously become known as a hacker and entrepreneur and was given suspended sentences for computer fraud and insider trading. As co-founder of the share host Megaupload, the authorities accuse him of "massive worldwide copyright infringements". Megaupload went offline at the beginning of 2012 following an international raid, the New Zealand police arrested Dotcom and searched his property. However, Dotcom was able to successfully fend off attempts by US prosecutors to have him extradited in the more than ten years that followed. Of the three men who were also arrested, two have since been sentenced to prison and one has died.
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The USA accuses Dotcom and other defendants of having made a total of around 175 million US dollars as operators of Megaupload, the streaming platform Megavideo and other websites. The US Department of Justice estimates the damage to rights holders at over 500 million US dollars. In February 2018, a court in New Zealand ruled that Dotcom could not be extradited for copyright infringement, but could be extradited for fraud. The news of his stroke now comes in the middle of the latest round of his legal battle. Following the New Zealand government's announcement that it wanted to extradite him, Dotcom's lawyer had announced that he intended to take legal action against this.
(mho)
