The information was provided by CNN Portugal which reported that the British judge who assessed the Portuguese request, made in February, decreed the extradition of Diogo Santos Coelho to Portugal, which should take place within a maximum period of ten days . However, given the existence of two competing requests, the British Public Prosecutor's Office forwarded the case to the minister, who has the authority to make the final decision.

The hacker's defense now has three months to appeal the decision to the British High Court of Justice, which could dictate the suspension of the deliberation, according to the same channel.

The young man was arrested on January 31, 2022 at Gatwick airport, in the United Kingdom, when he was going to visit his mother. Last summer, the British court accepted the request for extradition to the United States, something that the defense appealed, claiming that "he was diagnosed with autism and that he risks ending his own life if he is sent to serve a sentence in prison American".

Diogo Santos Coelho argued that he had been lured by adults since he was 14 years old to commit the alleged crimes, which are related to the RaidForums page, which he is accused of creating and managing. The site was described in court as being “a marketplace for individuals to buy and sell stolen databases”, having accumulated around 10 billion stolen records.

“Revenge”

“I'm afraid that the United States system will seek revenge, while I see the European systems, even the United Kingdom and Portugal, more inclined to rehabilitate someone and recognize that I was underage, and that I was exploited by adults. The Ministry of the Interior believes that this was the case”, said the young man, who was diagnosed with autism in 2022, in statements to The Guardian.

He continued: “I often lie awake all night thinking, 'What would happen if I went to America? What if I serve a long sentence and come out old?' I will have no prospects for the future. It makes me wonder what the point of living is, when I won't have a life in prison, or if I'll be able to get through the sentence and go free. I don’t see a life in going to America – it would just be a waste of time.”

The young man also says that, a few years after moving to the United Kingdom, his father bought him his first laptop, when he was 11 years old. As he had no other interests or friends, as he did not speak English and was a victim of bullying, he spent a lot of time on the computer.

“I had no one to talk to, I had no one at school because I had almost no friends and my only outlet was the Internet. My father didn't supervise me; my parents don’t know anything about computers,” he added.

The ‘hacker’ went further, ensuring that he is not trying to “escape justice”, but rather trying to “have a life and correct mistakes”.

“I was very young and impressionable [when the alleged crime occurred]. I was very naive,” he said.

Diogo Santos Coelho's defense considered that, in Portugal, the young man would probably be released on bail. In the United States, where he is accused of conspiracy, device access fraud and aggravated identity theft, he would spend months in pre-trial detention with inadequate mental health care.