From the New York Sun: SANTA ANA, Calif. — A major Chinese espionage case set to open today is causing concern among attorneys for major defense contractors and exporters, who contend that one of the prosecution’s key legal arguments upsets a long-standing interpretation of export laws and could wreak havoc in industry and elsewhere.

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Cliff Burns at ExportBlog.com reports that the technical data that was allegedly exported in violation of regulations is actually in the public domain and is therefore not export-restricted technical data – but the prosecution is trying to suppress or distort that fact.

Will this case re-interpret the meaning of public domain?

Cliff writes:

“The prosecution’s approach to this argument was to ask the trial court through a in Limine to forbid Mak (the defendant) from introducing any new evidence that these papers were presented at public conferences, which is rather like trying to suppress evidence that the victim is still alive at a murder trial.“

“The government’s basis for this outrageous claim is, well, outrageous. The government asserts that DDTC has certified that the two papers were technical data within the rule and then claims that this certification is immune from any judicial review.”

Keep a jaundiced eye on this one, folks.

Posted on March 30th, 2007 by keeton
Filed under: News