Autistic pc whizz pleads for UK to dam ‘hacking’ extradition

An autistic pc whizz from London accused of masterminding a world cybercrime racket has urged authorities to cease his extradition to the US.

Diogo Santos Coelho, 24, is on the centre of a tug-of-war between his native Portugal and the US on suspicion he was a key participant in a rip-off which offered the illegally obtained private particulars of tens of millions of victims, making shadowy criminals wealthy within the course of.

Santos Coelho, who was raised in Croydon, south London, stated he was successfully groomed as a friendless teenager, and had no thought he was doing something unsuitable.

He has cooperated absolutely with authorities since being arrested as he received off a flight into Gatwick in January 2022, and is set to ‘face justice’ – however not within the US.

Last night time, Santos Coelho informed the Mail on Sunday: ‘I’m merely attempting to return to my house nation, to my household, and face no matter penalties come at me.

‘I imagine Portugal, the nation of my start, and in Europe, I feel they concentrate on rehabilitation. But within the US, they’re focussed solely on retribution.

‘In America, I really feel there isn’t a hope.

‘Logically, due to my autism, I can not see a life past being despatched to America. When I consider that, I simply suppose: Why dwell in any respect?

‘So I hope the authorities perceive there’s a human facet to this, and let me face justice in Portugal.’

Santos Coelho appeared at Westminster Magistrates’ Court this month the place he consented to being extradited to Portugal the place he’s wished for cash laundering, tax fraud, and cyber criminality over his alleged function because the ‘chief administrator’ of the RaidForums web site.

But he’s additionally combating being despatched to the US amid fears for his human rights, with explicit concern jail situations is not going to take his lately recognized autism into consideration.

Santos Coelho is unable to touch upon the specifics of the case for authorized causes – together with, his defence crew say, as a result of they’re but to be supplied with  proof. There isn’t any requirement for the US to serve prima facie proof when looking for extradition from the UK.

But Santos Coelho is alleged to have pocketed greater than half 1,000,000 euro out of a rip-off through which victims throughout the planet are believed to have misplaced round £400 million.

Medical consultants concern the prospect of a 52-year jail time period and isolation from family and friends within the States, quite than a 12-year sentence in Portugal the place he has a assist community, make Santos Coelho at ‘excessive danger’ of suicide.

His enchantment towards extradition to the US is presently going by means of the High Court, so the choice of the place Santos Coelho ought to ultimately be despatched falls to the Home Office.

So how did a shy, ostracised and severely bullied teenager residing in Croydon change into what the US authorities imagine to be a significant participant in a world cybercrime scheme?

Santos Coelho stated he was a ‘friendless’ 11-year-old who sought solace in pc recreation chat rooms when he was befriended by a bunch of older contributors.

‘I used to be all the time very fascinated by computer systems and the way issues labored,’ he stated.

‘Then once I was round 13 or 14, these individuals who have been in my group on-line requested me if I may assist them construct a web site.

‘I had no subject with that, I used to be all the time very eager on studying methods to do new issues.

‘So I simply stated sure. And I suppose that is how that each one began.’

He stated these ‘buddies’, who he has by no means met in individual, informed him the web site would direct new followers to livestreamers, and would sometimes contain pranks – nothing ‘mischievous or unlawful’, he stated.

‘I used to be a baby, I basically did what they requested,’ he stated.

‘Over time I all the time tried to reassure myself I wasn’t doing something unlawful.

‘I’d all the time ask them: Is this unsuitable? Is this gonna get you or me in hassle?

‘And they might all the time guarantee me: No, you are only a developer of the web site.’

He stated these ‘buddies’ turned nasty and threatened him when, aged 16, he stated he wished to spend much less time on the web site and extra time on his engineering apprenticeship.

Santos Coelho and his household initially moved to England when he was 9 due to his father’s work.

But by the point he was 14, his mom was gravely sick with the degenerative situation Huntington’s Disease and Santos Coelho was apparently being mercilessly picked-on in school.

He is alleged to have spent a lot of his time in his room on the pc, free from any significant parental supervision.

It was at this stage, his attorneys argue, that the impressionable and naive Santos Coelho was ‘groomed and exploited’ by a lot older prison gangs on-line.

Santos Coelho stated: ‘Now, wanting again as an grownup, I feel the indicators are fairly apparent.

‘But once I was rising up, it by no means occurred to me, it was by no means in my thoughts that was being groomed or exploited.’

By the age of 16,  Santos Coelho had moved again to Portugal along with his father. 

And for the following six years, prosecutors say, he was the chief administrator for RaidForums, an English-language web site which allowed criminals to purchase and promote stolen private and monetary data, amounting to round 10 billion particular person data, comparable to financial institution accounts and fee particulars.

The web site was seized by the FBI in 2022, and Santos Coelho arrested. He was charged with six prison counts, together with conspiracy, entry gadget fraud and aggravated identification theft.

District Judge Michael Snow this month described each Santos Coelho and the system for which he was allegedly chief administrator as ‘very subtle’, and warned the suspect he confronted ‘a really substantial jail time period if convicted’.

But Ben Cooper KC, the suspect’s lawyer, knowledgeable the extradition court docket that the Home Office has already recognised that there are affordable grounds to imagine Santos Coelho was a sufferer of recent slavery, performing on behalf of these with nefarious plans for him.

His autism was undiagnosed on the time, and so he was not receiving any assist for his incapacity.

The case echoes that of Gary McKinnon, a British self-confessed ‘bumbling pc nerd’ who was wished within the US for hacking into Pentagon and Nasa computer systems in a naive try to unearth details about UFOs greater than 20 years in the past.

Mr McKinnon has Asperger’s, a type of autism, although, like Santos Coelho, his situation was undiagnosed on the time of the alleged offending.

He confronted as much as 60 years behind bars if convicted, however was blocked from being extradited to the US by then-Home Secretary Theresa May in 2012 following a relentless Daily Mail marketing campaign to permit him to go on trial in England. The Crown Prosecution Service later confirmed no fees could be introduced towards Mr McKinnon.

Mr Cooper KC stated: ‘Bearing in thoughts that Diogo is a sufferer of grooming and suffers from autism, a incapacity that was exploited by on-line adults when he was nonetheless a baby and the impression an extradition to the US would have (size of sentence, jail situations, away from household, danger of suicide), it’s pointless and clearly disproportionate for extradition to America to take precedence / to proceed given his consent to extradition to Portugal and his full cooperation with the Portuguese authorities.’

A Home Office spokesman stated: ‘It is longstanding authorities coverage that we don’t routinely touch upon particular person circumstances.’