I have read somewhere previously that someone claiming to be the hacker came forward anonymously and said they would indeed take it to court if they lost the funds due to intervention via a fork[1]. Who knows if this was really the hacker, or whether it was a credible threat even assuming it was.

[1]: http://pastebin.com/CcGUBgDG

Given that the supposed signature isn't even in a valid format, it's unlikely to be the hacker.

I don't think so, because if he claims "the code" is everything and even if the judges accept that argument, then the logical consequence is that, if "the code" allows for a hard fork, then the hard fork is "the code" as much as his attempt to drain funds.

I'm not a lawyer, but as I understood, the famous "the code is the law" quote is written in the DAO's terms of service (that's the whole reason why it could have any legal relevance at all: They basically tried to make the code their terms of service)

Therefore changing the code would be equivalent to updating the terms of service - and many judicial systems restrict when and how you can do that.

So I don't think it would be that easy.