Jimmy Wales, the Wikipedia cofounder, has taken on the cause of UK university student Richard O'Dwyer, who faces extradition to the US for running a "link" site called TVShack.net.

"Richard O'Dwyer is the human face of the battle between the content industry and the interests of the general public," wrote Wales this weekend when creating an O'Dwyer petition online. "Earlier this year, in the fight against the anti-copyright bills SOPA and PIPA, the public won its first big victory. This could be our second."

The deeply troubling case, which we've reported on in depth, involves a UK resident running a UK website, doing nothing apparently illegal under UK law (the UK dropped its own investigation), and linking to material rather than hosting it himself. While this might be found illegal by a US court, it's not obviously illegal; the links on the site were largely submitted by users and O'Dwyer removed them if a rightsholder complained. (That said, the argument that TVShack.net was nothing more than a search engine rings a bit hollow; the site's very name and narrow focus suggest that O'Dwyer had more than theoretical knowledge that his site wasn't being used for public domain broadcasts.)

While innocent until proven guilty, the extradition process would impose a brutal penalty—forced movement to America for the entire duration of the trial—on O'Dwyer before he even gets a hearing. For a college student accused of some secondary liability for infringement, it's more than a little much. Napster, Grokster, and LimeWire were all civil matters; The Pirate Bay prosecution was handled in Sweden, where the site's backers lived. But, although the UK extradites almost no one for computer-related crimes, O'Dwyer is apparently going to be made an example of; the UK Home Secretary, Theresa May, won't hold up his extradition, which could happen this fall.

Now, Wales is trying to rally people to pressure May, so that she will put the brakes on the case.

"Copyright is an important institution, serving a beneficial moral and economic purpose," says the petition. "But that does not mean that copyright can or should be unlimited. It does not mean that we should abandon time honored moral and legal principles to allow endless encroachments on our civil liberties in the interests of the moguls of Hollywood."

While O'Dwyer's actions don't look as innocent as some of his defenders make out, the extremity of the reaction is surprising. Wales's petition doesn't call for O'Dwyer to escape all consequences for his actions, but asks that the questions involving the site "be investigated and tried here in the UK, not in the US."

The petition has attracted 14,000 signers in its first day, though it will need many more to have any impact on May; she has already been targeted by a 20,000-strong petition and refused to act.

Speaking to The Guardian this weekend, O'Dwyer explained his current state of mind. "I think about it sometimes during the day, but I try to think about other things that are more important. I don't let their extradition warrant ruin my life. Otherwise you'd fail university, just sit in your room all day moaning. They'd be winning if I let it do that."