That assumption is precisely the problem. We know that Assange published U.S. government secrets. We know that the U.S. government doesn't like this despite the fact that it's perfectly legal. We know that the current administration is willing to bend the rules to get what it wants. All that makes it plausible that Assange is being charged with crimes not because the U.S. government has a good-faith belief that he actually committed them, but to punish him for doing something that the U.S. government doesn't like, notwithstanding that it's legal.
For the record, I am no fan of Assange. I think he's a dick. But even dicks are entitled to equal protection under the law.
I chose my words carefully and said "guilty" not as in "guilty of doing the things we all know he did" but "guilty of the crimes he has been/will be indicted of".
Assuming he is guilty of various crimes, how should he have been and be treated?
Or in other words what is wrong with the "due process" w.r.t. Assange?
Or is it simply that "he's not guilty" but will get convicted by an unfair justice system therefore the only just action is to leave him be?
> A fair justice system does not convict all those who are guilty. It ensures that the innocent are not convicted.
A fair justice system does both. But fairness is unattainable, so one has to decide which failures are more desirable—the preference you suggest is both common and one I agree with, but it is not fairness but instead a preference for dealing with fairness being impractical.
I understand. I chose my words very carefully too when I said, "That assumption is precisely the problem."
The reason we have due process is not because society gets off on legal rituals, it's because a person can in fact be innocent despite the existence of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. As soon as you say, "Let's assume guilt," you've tossed due process out the window. "Innocent until proven guilty" is not just a catchy slogan. It's the bedrock of due process of law.
The answer to your question, "How is he being treated differently than what you would expect this hypothetical person should be treated?" is precisely that: you are hypothesizing his guilt before it has been proven. That is how he is being treated differently than I would hope and expect.
The problem in Assange's case is that it is very hard to separate the charges being brought against him from the fact that he did something that is almost certainly legal but which the U.S. government would like very much to punish him for. The fact of the matter is that you can make someone's life miserable by bringing trumped-up charges against them, and this is especially easy to do if you're a powerful person. And if you're powerful enough then you can most likely do this with impunity. The possibility that this is happening to Assange needs to be taken very seriously.
So no, there is no overt indication that Assange is being treated any differently from any other accused rapist. But anyone who is content to leave it at that has blinders on.
I don't know that he is being mistreated. I am saying that the possibility that he is being railroaded needs to be taken seriously [1]. That's all.
And yes, I'm aware that his actions helped the current administration, and it therefore doesn't make sense that they would railroad him. But this would not be the first time that this administration threw a former ally under the bus.
>hypothesizing his guilt before it has been proven
>That is how he is being treated differently than I would hope and expect.
You have problems with the assumption of guilt? Ok (setting aside how you know what people think), what actions are being taken as a result which are inappropriate?
If you have problems with due process it can't just be with what people assume, it has to be with their decisions and actions?
Put aside their assumptions and talk about actions. What is being done that violates due process?
Assume everyone executing the process is an angel at heart, what actions are wrong and why?
It has so far eluded me to get someone who thinks Assange is innocent to explain how he is being mistreated.
I don't claim he is innocent but the argument is well known: he is a journalist who had no obligations to the U.S. government regarding what they want to maintain a secret, so going after him for exposing some information is mistreating him and by implication an attack on independent journalism. U.S. government had a breach of security and ethics, but instead of quietly fixing that they target journalists.
I don't know that. If there is a reason to believe he commited a crime that harmed the U.S.A., then the U.S. government going after him for that crime is to be expected. But the widespread concern here is that the government is going after him so devotedly not solely because of that harm, but because they seek to gain back face and intimidate other journalists. There are other possible ulterior motives. I don't have enough information to decide one way or another, but given what we know, the concern is reasonable.
I didn't say he was. People who expose government secrets often get railroaded as a result. That doesn't make it right.
[UPDATE] I'd like to expand on my earlier answer. It depends on what you consider to be "his situation" because Assange is in two separate situations: he's an accused rapist, and he is a publisher of sensitive government secrets. The problem is not that he's being treated any differently from any other accused rapist or from any other publisher of sensitive government secrets. The problem is the possibility that he is in the first situation because he is in the second situation.
No, he's an "accused rapist" because two separate women accused him of various forms of rape under Sweden's domestic rape laws.
Quite ironically, Assange is being railroaded because he tried to avoid the rape charges, which led to his self-imposed Ecuadorian imprisonment, his current British imprisonment, and his future US and/or Swedish imprisonment. If he hadn't tried to flee, it's possible the Swedish charges would have been dropped after perfunctory investigation. The British would never have needed to jail him. The previous US administration would likely have filed minimal charges against him or sought a token punishment to serve as a deterrent to others.
Plenty of others have exposed government secrets. Many of them won Pulitizers for their efforts...
We know that the current administration is willing to bend the rules to get what it wants.
Assange is partially responsible for the current administration taking office...If anything, they would be bending over backwards to find a way to pardon him for that favor. And also for embarrassing the previous political administration.
It turns out, it's not politics. It's that the US government believes that Assange broke the law when he tried to help Manning. If it were another set of laws, they might have turned a blind eye. But trying to decrypt classified information, and furthermore, publishing classified information that put US field personnel at risk...that's not something they'll ever let slide, because it sets a precedent that there's no punishment for stealing classified US intelligence.
Contrast that to WaPo and other newspapers which faced no punishment for publishing classified documents...because they didn't come by those documents illegally.
A hypothetical Australian citizen who did things in Britain which are legal there but illegal in the U.S. would simply not be detained at all.
It doesn’t matter whether Assange committed these so-called crimes because he was never under obligation to follow U.S. law in the first place.
I don’t see why Russian private citizens who broke U.S. election law should be detained either. I don’t approve of their behavior from an ethics perspective, but from a legal perspective it’s not their responsibility to follow laws in a country where they have no rights.
If I conspired, from California, with people in Tibet to circumvent Chinese law, I also would not expect to be detained by U.S. police.
> A hypothetical Australian citizen who did things in Britain which are legal there but illegal in the U.S. would simply not be detained at all.
I'm pretty sure the US-UK extradition agreement uses the double illegality rule, so Assange is safe from extradition if the British court finds that what he is accused of by the US is legal in the UK.
Most of the US charges against Assange, like hacking, are also crimes in the UK.
He made himself subject to the jurisdiction of the US when he decided to try and decrypt US classified information. This is also why the Russians were detained. They made themselves subject to US law when they decided to get involved in US elections.
If I conspired, from California, with people in Tibet to circumvent Chinese law, I also would not expect to be detained by U.S. police.
That is because the US does not have an extradition treaty with China, so it doesn't matter what Chinese crimes you are accused of committing. Though generally, the US would not extradite for political crimes, so if your Tibetan activities involved organizing political resistant or independence movements, you would be protected by the First Amendment while in the US.
Isn't obtaining and decrypting classified information what journalists are expected to do in America? The onus is on the government to keep the secret secret. If they are unable to do that, why lash out on journalists?
Isn't obtaining and decrypting classified information what journalists are expected to do in America
Part of the government trying to keep things secret is using the procedures set forth by our laws to enforce secrets. Prosecuting those who leak classified information is one of those procedures...
Obtaining and publishing classified information is permissible if the information is a matter of the public interest, i.e., war crimes, embezzlement, violations of constitutional rights, etc.. Journalists are expected, and required, to use their discretion in determining what information is appropriate to publish. Indiscriminately posting classified information is not protected, especially when releasing that information puts hundreds of lives at risk.
There is an article from a Swedish tabloid which could be of interest [1], unfortunately only available in Swedish AFAIK. The reason this article is of interest is mainly that it shows that the Swedish prosecutors seem to be extremely reluctant to issue arrest warrants for people in other EU countries.
In summary, and I hope I do not misrepresent the article too much, a man from Sweden went on a one-day cruise to the Åland Islands. After being out partying on the ship he goes back to his cabin. On his way there he meets two musicians (temporarily) employed by the cruise company and somehow get into a fight with them. (The article is very sparse on details on how the fight started, for the record.)
Note that the fight takes place in front of a CCTV camera, and supposedly one can see on the surveillance photos one of the musicians taking charge and stomping the victim five times in the head, with full force. After briefly leaving, the musicians then returns and kicks him in the face, twice.
The article then discusses the subpar response from the security guards employed by the cruise company.
The musicians are later arrested by the Åland police, their identities checked, but are later released. According to the article they are released because the possible crime was committed in Swedish territory and they are not Finnish citizens [2]. The musicians then return home to Ireland.
However, Swedish police or prosecutors do not seem interested in investigating this case. When pressed on why the prosecutor does not issue an arrest warrant for the men, their identities and whereabouts are supposedly known, he responds by saying that the Swedish prosecutor authority cannot go chasing people all across Europe and they only issue arrest warrants for very serious crimes, like murder.
To summarize the timeline. These events took place in October 2009, if I understand correctly. The Assange case started in August 2010. The news paper article was published in late October 2010.
So, according to this tabloid story, this is an open and shut case for a fairly serious crime, and still the prosecutor authority cannot even be arsed to issue an arrest warrant. At the same time they keep Assange locked in an embassy far longer than he could even be sentenced to for the crime he is accused of commiting. And the Assange case certainly seems much more flimsy, I'm not even sure what he is accused of, exactly. But it certainly seems to boil down to some he-said, she-said situation that will be completely impossible to get to the bottom of.
IIRC he can at most be sentenced to 4 years in prison for the sex crimes he is accused of in Sweden. But in practice he will be released after serving two thirds of this sentence, so he would spend at most 2.6 years in prison. Note also that it seems to me EXTREMLY unlikely that he would recieve a sentence of 4 years, at the very most 2 years but 1 year seems more probable. So if he just left the embassy, went to Sweden and lost the case, then he would most likely be a free man after just 8 months. So his actions certainly seem to indicate that he fears something more than just being found guilty of "less-severe rape". (Sounds a bit weird but is the crime he is accused of IIUC.)
Just to reiterate, he has spent close to 7 years in the embassy for a crime which he would quite likely serve 8 months in prison for.
With the caveat that I am now a lawyer, and whatnot. Quite possibly I've screwed something up in this last part of the analysis.
Edit: To further clarify the point, I guess it is that there is maybe not anything wrong with how he is being treated if one looks at this case in isolation. But when one combines this with how other cases seem to be handled, as well as considering proportionality, things are less clear.
At the same time they keep Assange locked in an embassy far longer than he could even be sentenced to for the crime he is accused of commiting.
It was Assange's choice to go the embassy, to request asylum, and to remain there for 7 years. Nobody made him do that.
And the Assange case certainly seems much more flimsy, I'm not even sure what he is accused of, exactly. But it certainly seems to boil down to some he-said, she-said situation that will be completely impossible to get to the bottom of.
Possibly. Assange fled to the embassy when he was informed he would be extradited to Sweden to face an investigation. One of the weird things about Swedish law is that back then it might not have allowed criminal investigations in absentia.
So his actions certainly seem to indicate that he fears something more than just being found guilty of "less-severe rape". (Sounds a bit weird but is the crime he is accused of IIUC.)
This answer is actually known. If he had been found guilty of rape in Sweden, he would have been deported back to Australia (since he is an Australian citizen). And Australia has no restrictions on extradition to the US, such as the exception for capital charges commonly found in the EU.
But when one combines this with how other cases seem to be handled, as well as considering proportionality, things are less clear.
This one is easy. That was actually Swedish policy (and possibly actually Swedish law) back then not to pursue criminal cases against foreigners outside of Sweden, and they applied this same policy to Assange as well. [https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-14/julian-assange-to-be-...] But then the prosecutor got absolutely railed in Sweden for letting an accused rapist escape justice simply because he fled the jurisdiction. Unlike the Aland Islands case, in which the suspects were arrested but permitted by authorities to return home, Assange simply left...and that makes all the difference. It's one thing for someone to escape justice because authorities fucked up. But it's another thing to let someone escape justice simply because they decided to opt out of the process.
As explained in the answer to a sibling post, the question of if he is "locked" in the embassy or not seems mostly a philosophical one. Just imagine I used a different word if you do not like it.
The point I tired to make when I wrote this was that in some cases the Swedish prosecutor authority felt it was too inconvenient to even file European Arrest Warrants in the first place, and a prosecutor saying that this was only done in stuff like murder cases. Then in another case they are keeping a guy in house arrest for 7 years. I made this comment in reply to a request for how Assange was being treated differently compared to other people.
The second point about criminal investigations in absentia mostly seems like a "fun fact", and I dont really see anything I can reply to. Sorry if I'm missing something here.
Regarding the third point, yes, that was my whole point that Assange has shown that he seems to have genuine fear of being the victim of some form of human rights violations should he be extradited to the US. Since if he had no such fears, he could go to Sweden, and even if he loses the case he would be out walking in maybe as little as 8 months. Now he has spent 7 years in an embassy. It seems to me clear that he has demonstrated that he is not hiding in the embassy because he is afraid of the rape allegations in Sweden. If his fears are justified or not, I am not in a position to give any kind of serious answer to.
I am unable to find any support in the linked article that Sweden did not pursue criminal cases against foreigners outside of Sweden. But if you have any such evidence, and that there was a policy change with regards to Assange, then this is highly relevant in that it shows that Assange is not treated the same as others. In the tabloid article I linked the prosecutor seem to claim that for example in murder cases an international arrest warrant would be issued.
I'm not sure in what sense the prosecutor was railed for letting Assange go. And if so, which prosecutory? In fact, the Åland island case and Assange seem rather similar. Assange too was permitted to leave Sweden, according to the article you linked [1]
[1]: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-14/julian-assange-to-be-... Section "What happened next?", relevant paragraph "By the time a Swedish court ruled that Mr Assange should be detained for questioning, he had flown back to London (after being granted permission to do so by Swedish authorities). "
The points I tried to make are (a) Assange has only himself to blame for being stuck there for 7 years and then getting kicked out, and (b) that Sweden had a formal policy, and possibly even a law about not prosecuting non-Swedish individuals who were not physical in Swedish territory.
That article pretty clearly states that the prosecutor believed that Swedish law prevented the investigation from proceeding, and that matches what the prosecutor in the article you cited said to the tabloid.
The policy was changed because of Assange. It's not specially applied to him--the new policy applies to everyone. He's just the only one you here about outside Sweden because he's globally infamous.
Is there anything about this change? Because I'm certain Sweden has indicted people in absentia long before Assange, though it is rare. E.g. I'm pretty sure they indicted the person later convicted of the assassination of foreign minister Anna Lindh in absentia before he was apprehended, and that was back in 2003.
I'll also note that the prosecutor was contradicted by Swedish legal experts already back when Assange was detained in the UK and Ny first made that claim. It was noteworthy also because Swedish police sent people to interview two suspected murderers elsewhere in Europe while Assange's extradiction case was happening, yet Ny continued to claim it was impossible for her to do so with Assange.
I think Assange was being paranoid, but I also think Ny was letting her own preferences take precedence over pursuing the case as best possible, for whatever her reasons might be (I've in the past suggested that rather than US involvement it's more likely she "just" wanted to make an example of him, but that's pure speculation)
I'm not sure why you do not just provide a citation for this claim that Swedish law prevented the investigation from proceeding. The claim which seems to be the closest to this seems to be "In 2010, the prosecutor in charge of the case, Marianne Ny, said Swedish law prevented her from questioning anyone by video link or in the London embassy.". However, the very next sentence in the article goes on to say that "She later admitted it was legally possible, but refused to budge, saying that questioning him in the embassy 'would lower the quality of the interview'."
With regards to the policy change, to some extent I dont care if they apply it consistently to other people now as well. Just that they changed the policy when they were chasing a guy who had pissed of and embarrassed the most powerful nation in the world seems very, well, convenient.
Perhaps more importantly, I'm not sure I am convinced that there has been such a massive policy shift as such. I would like to hear more about these other people that are being chased all around Europe by the Swedish prosecutor authority, but we don't hear about because they are not globally infamous.
I should perhaps add that just because Assange is (possibly) treated differently, this does not prove that there is some conspiracy against him or whatever. This case has gathered a lot of media attention and whatnot. In many ways a conspiracy seems unlikely, or at least unnecessary. Many of the actors involved seems to just follow the path of least resistance and/or acting in their own interest. Sweden does not have much to lose by doing this, certainly relations between US and Sweden are not damaged by this. Marianne Ny seems like a somewhat crazy feminist who IIRC has made statements that the methods she has developed for investigating crimes against women has "good effect on the perpetrator even in those cases where he is not found guilty by a court of law".
> At the same time they keep Assange locked in an embassy
Assange wasn't locked in the embassy. He was free (and encouraged by the British, and until they gave up the Swedish) to leave at any time.
Assange chose to stay in the embassy for longer than his likely worst-case sentence, until expelled, in a futile attempt to avoid potential US charges he wasn't then facing and which his decision to delay proceedings so long made actually enabled to come through while he was still in custody following the expiration of Ecuadorian hospitality.
Firstly, I was replying to a post which asked for in which concrete ways Assange was being treated differently from other people in similar situations. I have a bit of a hard time understanding why this phrasing of mine which is not terribly important need to be debated, but OK.
I have in all honestly not followed the Assange case that closely. But my understanding of the situation was that he went to the embassy because he feared he would be extradited to the US and face possible human rights violations if that were the case. Maybe he is de jure "free" to leave the embassy, but it is not as clear that he is de facto free to leave.
Simple example, suppose we just get rid of all the governments etc, and everyone is just "free" to do whatever they want. So in this fantastic world, maybe you are "free" to do whatever you want, but if you do certain things then some big bad guy comes and turns you into minced meat. Are you then "free" to do whatever you want, maybe this can be argued, I am not an expert in philosophy. But if you find it shocking that some (most?) people do not consider this to make you free to do these things, then I'm not sure what to say.
Secondly, you do not allow people to make different interpretations of the situation. You claim that this was a "futile attempt to avoid potential US charges he wasn't then facing", and sure, if you can prove this beyond reasonable doubt then of course there is nothing to discuss here. However, I see no such proof, not even an attempt at such a thing.
More concretely, are you going to tell me with a straight face that if you were in the position of Assange you would without batting an eye just go to Sweden and risk being extradited to the US? Like the US runs Guantanamo, bombs countries left right and center without UN approval, Snowden who exposed government lies and breaking of laws lives in exile, etc. Please note, my point here isn't that the US is terrible or anything, but just that Assange can have a justified fear of being treated poorly there given the circumstances.
So the question isn't really "which way is it", will Assange face human rights violations if he is extradited to the US? Rather the question seems to me to be something like, is it "completly insane" for Assange to think that he might face these violations.
Bet ya all they are doing now is yelling "wolf" and postponing a true extradition till when the storm has settled and he has been forgotten once again.
If there's one thing you can count on in this world, it's Julian Assange tooting his own horn loud enough for everyone who cares, and most of the people who don't, to hear.
This seems to be more of a minor procedural issue rather than anything meaningful. The court agrees there is probable cause and a flight risk, but denied “detention in absentia” because he’s already in custody.
Quote:
The Court has, at a hearing today, decided that there is probable cause for the suspicion of rape, less serious incident, and that there is a risk that Julian Assange will fail to appear or in some other way avoid participation in the investigation and the following proceedings.
The Court has, however, found that a detention order would not be in accordance with the principle of proportionality. Since Julian Assange is serving a prison sentence the public prosecutor can proceed with the preliminary investigation by issuing a European Investigation Order.
It is quite interesting though, given how loudly the prosecutor originally insisted he absolutely had to be brought to Sweden before they could proceed, to now have a judge confirming that the investigation does not require him to be present in Sweden (yes, I realize that it is in part because he is in custody and so it can be ensured he remains available, so the situations are not exactly the same, but the prosecutor did not argue that he needed to remain in custody, but specifically that he needed to be brought to Sweden).
This to me suggest that irrespective of whether or not Assange is guilty, the prosecutor mishandled the cases - parts of the charges had to be dropped because of the statute of limitations because they failed to act while he was in custody in the UK while arguing over something a Swedish judge has now said is not a prerequisite to continuing investigation.
It was mishandled from day one when the prosecutors office acknowledged that Assange was under investigation, this on it's own was - while not strictly illegal - something essentially unheard of in Sweden, especially for a case involving a possible rape charge.
It was highly irregular, and considering how much of police and prosecutor actions in Sweden are based on professional ethics, rather then laws themselves, the level of irregular behavior clearly stands out in this case, as it also did in the pirate bay case, but that's a story for another time. Yes, we really should put more of the rules for police and prosecution into law, there's too much leeway as it is today.
Back to the topic at hand.
Rape cases are usually not public, they almost alwaya are played out without anyone except legal teams, judge, prosecutor, lay judges present. Thus since the trial is in private, and an exoneration in court is then less 'visible' than the public "accusation" cause by naming the suspect, the view is generally that the courts and prosecution should not explicitly name people in the kind of cases you expect to be held in that setting, or in generall - cases where publicly naming suspects can cause undue harm to the suspected regardless of the veracity of the accusations.
It was as far as I can recall still unusual for any accused to be publicly named, much less so for cases expected to be tried behind locked doors. Usually public naming of suspects only happened if the suspect was deemed to be violent enough that the public needed to be warned.
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 96.8 ms ] threadHow is he being treated differently than what you would expect this hypothetical person should be treated?
For the record, I am no fan of Assange. I think he's a dick. But even dicks are entitled to equal protection under the law.
Assuming he is guilty of various crimes, how should he have been and be treated?
Or in other words what is wrong with the "due process" w.r.t. Assange?
Or is it simply that "he's not guilty" but will get convicted by an unfair justice system therefore the only just action is to leave him be?
A fair justice system does both. But fairness is unattainable, so one has to decide which failures are more desirable—the preference you suggest is both common and one I agree with, but it is not fairness but instead a preference for dealing with fairness being impractical.
I understand. I chose my words very carefully too when I said, "That assumption is precisely the problem."
The reason we have due process is not because society gets off on legal rituals, it's because a person can in fact be innocent despite the existence of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. As soon as you say, "Let's assume guilt," you've tossed due process out the window. "Innocent until proven guilty" is not just a catchy slogan. It's the bedrock of due process of law.
The answer to your question, "How is he being treated differently than what you would expect this hypothetical person should be treated?" is precisely that: you are hypothesizing his guilt before it has been proven. That is how he is being treated differently than I would hope and expect.
Let's assume we are uninterested in Assange's guilt and only interested in due process.
How is he being treated unfairly w.r.t. due process? (either illegally or if the laws are unjust, immorally)
So no, there is no overt indication that Assange is being treated any differently from any other accused rapist. But anyone who is content to leave it at that has blinders on.
How is he being mistreated specifically.
And yes, I'm aware that his actions helped the current administration, and it therefore doesn't make sense that they would railroad him. But this would not be the first time that this administration threw a former ally under the bus.
[1] https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/charging-julia...
>That is how he is being treated differently than I would hope and expect.
You have problems with the assumption of guilt? Ok (setting aside how you know what people think), what actions are being taken as a result which are inappropriate?
If you have problems with due process it can't just be with what people assume, it has to be with their decisions and actions?
Put aside their assumptions and talk about actions. What is being done that violates due process?
Assume everyone executing the process is an angel at heart, what actions are wrong and why?
It has so far eluded me to get someone who thinks Assange is innocent to explain how he is being mistreated.
What gives you this opinion of him?
[UPDATE] I'd like to expand on my earlier answer. It depends on what you consider to be "his situation" because Assange is in two separate situations: he's an accused rapist, and he is a publisher of sensitive government secrets. The problem is not that he's being treated any differently from any other accused rapist or from any other publisher of sensitive government secrets. The problem is the possibility that he is in the first situation because he is in the second situation.
So far you have failed to name any actions you see as inappropriate.
What rules are being bent? Which actions violate due process or equal protection? Can you name any specific issues?
Quite ironically, Assange is being railroaded because he tried to avoid the rape charges, which led to his self-imposed Ecuadorian imprisonment, his current British imprisonment, and his future US and/or Swedish imprisonment. If he hadn't tried to flee, it's possible the Swedish charges would have been dropped after perfunctory investigation. The British would never have needed to jail him. The previous US administration would likely have filed minimal charges against him or sought a token punishment to serve as a deterrent to others.
Plenty of others have exposed government secrets. Many of them won Pulitizers for their efforts...
Like Snowden exposing basically the biggest conspiracy of government employees breaking federal laws ever seen?
Journalists win Pulitzers, whistleblowers get their lives ruined for exposing criminal activity. This is a common theme the world over.
Assange is partially responsible for the current administration taking office...If anything, they would be bending over backwards to find a way to pardon him for that favor. And also for embarrassing the previous political administration.
It turns out, it's not politics. It's that the US government believes that Assange broke the law when he tried to help Manning. If it were another set of laws, they might have turned a blind eye. But trying to decrypt classified information, and furthermore, publishing classified information that put US field personnel at risk...that's not something they'll ever let slide, because it sets a precedent that there's no punishment for stealing classified US intelligence.
Contrast that to WaPo and other newspapers which faced no punishment for publishing classified documents...because they didn't come by those documents illegally.
It doesn’t matter whether Assange committed these so-called crimes because he was never under obligation to follow U.S. law in the first place.
I don’t see why Russian private citizens who broke U.S. election law should be detained either. I don’t approve of their behavior from an ethics perspective, but from a legal perspective it’s not their responsibility to follow laws in a country where they have no rights.
If I conspired, from California, with people in Tibet to circumvent Chinese law, I also would not expect to be detained by U.S. police.
I'm pretty sure the US-UK extradition agreement uses the double illegality rule, so Assange is safe from extradition if the British court finds that what he is accused of by the US is legal in the UK.
He made himself subject to the jurisdiction of the US when he decided to try and decrypt US classified information. This is also why the Russians were detained. They made themselves subject to US law when they decided to get involved in US elections.
If I conspired, from California, with people in Tibet to circumvent Chinese law, I also would not expect to be detained by U.S. police.
That is because the US does not have an extradition treaty with China, so it doesn't matter what Chinese crimes you are accused of committing. Though generally, the US would not extradite for political crimes, so if your Tibetan activities involved organizing political resistant or independence movements, you would be protected by the First Amendment while in the US.
Part of the government trying to keep things secret is using the procedures set forth by our laws to enforce secrets. Prosecuting those who leak classified information is one of those procedures...
Obtaining and publishing classified information is permissible if the information is a matter of the public interest, i.e., war crimes, embezzlement, violations of constitutional rights, etc.. Journalists are expected, and required, to use their discretion in determining what information is appropriate to publish. Indiscriminately posting classified information is not protected, especially when releasing that information puts hundreds of lives at risk.
Also, note that Assange is charged with computer crimes.
In summary, and I hope I do not misrepresent the article too much, a man from Sweden went on a one-day cruise to the Åland Islands. After being out partying on the ship he goes back to his cabin. On his way there he meets two musicians (temporarily) employed by the cruise company and somehow get into a fight with them. (The article is very sparse on details on how the fight started, for the record.)
Note that the fight takes place in front of a CCTV camera, and supposedly one can see on the surveillance photos one of the musicians taking charge and stomping the victim five times in the head, with full force. After briefly leaving, the musicians then returns and kicks him in the face, twice.
The article then discusses the subpar response from the security guards employed by the cruise company.
The musicians are later arrested by the Åland police, their identities checked, but are later released. According to the article they are released because the possible crime was committed in Swedish territory and they are not Finnish citizens [2]. The musicians then return home to Ireland.
However, Swedish police or prosecutors do not seem interested in investigating this case. When pressed on why the prosecutor does not issue an arrest warrant for the men, their identities and whereabouts are supposedly known, he responds by saying that the Swedish prosecutor authority cannot go chasing people all across Europe and they only issue arrest warrants for very serious crimes, like murder.
To summarize the timeline. These events took place in October 2009, if I understand correctly. The Assange case started in August 2010. The news paper article was published in late October 2010.
So, according to this tabloid story, this is an open and shut case for a fairly serious crime, and still the prosecutor authority cannot even be arsed to issue an arrest warrant. At the same time they keep Assange locked in an embassy far longer than he could even be sentenced to for the crime he is accused of commiting. And the Assange case certainly seems much more flimsy, I'm not even sure what he is accused of, exactly. But it certainly seems to boil down to some he-said, she-said situation that will be completely impossible to get to the bottom of.
IIRC he can at most be sentenced to 4 years in prison for the sex crimes he is accused of in Sweden. But in practice he will be released after serving two thirds of this sentence, so he would spend at most 2.6 years in prison. Note also that it seems to me EXTREMLY unlikely that he would recieve a sentence of 4 years, at the very most 2 years but 1 year seems more probable. So if he just left the embassy, went to Sweden and lost the case, then he would most likely be a free man after just 8 months. So his actions certainly seem to indicate that he fears something more than just being found guilty of "less-severe rape". (Sounds a bit weird but is the crime he is accused of IIUC.)
Just to reiterate, he has spent close to 7 years in the embassy for a crime which he would quite likely serve 8 months in prison for.
With the caveat that I am now a lawyer, and whatnot. Quite possibly I've screwed something up in this last part of the analysis.
Edit: To further clarify the point, I guess it is that there is maybe not anything wrong with how he is being treated if one looks at this case in isolation. But when one combines this with how other cases seem to be handled, as well as considering proportionality, things are less clear.
[1]: https://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/a/ka8ndv/har-sparkar-han-...
...
It was Assange's choice to go the embassy, to request asylum, and to remain there for 7 years. Nobody made him do that.
And the Assange case certainly seems much more flimsy, I'm not even sure what he is accused of, exactly. But it certainly seems to boil down to some he-said, she-said situation that will be completely impossible to get to the bottom of.
Possibly. Assange fled to the embassy when he was informed he would be extradited to Sweden to face an investigation. One of the weird things about Swedish law is that back then it might not have allowed criminal investigations in absentia.
So his actions certainly seem to indicate that he fears something more than just being found guilty of "less-severe rape". (Sounds a bit weird but is the crime he is accused of IIUC.)
This answer is actually known. If he had been found guilty of rape in Sweden, he would have been deported back to Australia (since he is an Australian citizen). And Australia has no restrictions on extradition to the US, such as the exception for capital charges commonly found in the EU.
But when one combines this with how other cases seem to be handled, as well as considering proportionality, things are less clear.
This one is easy. That was actually Swedish policy (and possibly actually Swedish law) back then not to pursue criminal cases against foreigners outside of Sweden, and they applied this same policy to Assange as well. [https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-14/julian-assange-to-be-...] But then the prosecutor got absolutely railed in Sweden for letting an accused rapist escape justice simply because he fled the jurisdiction. Unlike the Aland Islands case, in which the suspects were arrested but permitted by authorities to return home, Assange simply left...and that makes all the difference. It's one thing for someone to escape justice because authorities fucked up. But it's another thing to let someone escape justice simply because they decided to opt out of the process.
The point I tired to make when I wrote this was that in some cases the Swedish prosecutor authority felt it was too inconvenient to even file European Arrest Warrants in the first place, and a prosecutor saying that this was only done in stuff like murder cases. Then in another case they are keeping a guy in house arrest for 7 years. I made this comment in reply to a request for how Assange was being treated differently compared to other people.
The second point about criminal investigations in absentia mostly seems like a "fun fact", and I dont really see anything I can reply to. Sorry if I'm missing something here.
Regarding the third point, yes, that was my whole point that Assange has shown that he seems to have genuine fear of being the victim of some form of human rights violations should he be extradited to the US. Since if he had no such fears, he could go to Sweden, and even if he loses the case he would be out walking in maybe as little as 8 months. Now he has spent 7 years in an embassy. It seems to me clear that he has demonstrated that he is not hiding in the embassy because he is afraid of the rape allegations in Sweden. If his fears are justified or not, I am not in a position to give any kind of serious answer to.
I am unable to find any support in the linked article that Sweden did not pursue criminal cases against foreigners outside of Sweden. But if you have any such evidence, and that there was a policy change with regards to Assange, then this is highly relevant in that it shows that Assange is not treated the same as others. In the tabloid article I linked the prosecutor seem to claim that for example in murder cases an international arrest warrant would be issued.
I'm not sure in what sense the prosecutor was railed for letting Assange go. And if so, which prosecutory? In fact, the Åland island case and Assange seem rather similar. Assange too was permitted to leave Sweden, according to the article you linked [1]
[1]: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-14/julian-assange-to-be-... Section "What happened next?", relevant paragraph "By the time a Swedish court ruled that Mr Assange should be detained for questioning, he had flown back to London (after being granted permission to do so by Swedish authorities). "
That article pretty clearly states that the prosecutor believed that Swedish law prevented the investigation from proceeding, and that matches what the prosecutor in the article you cited said to the tabloid.
The policy was changed because of Assange. It's not specially applied to him--the new policy applies to everyone. He's just the only one you here about outside Sweden because he's globally infamous.
I'll also note that the prosecutor was contradicted by Swedish legal experts already back when Assange was detained in the UK and Ny first made that claim. It was noteworthy also because Swedish police sent people to interview two suspected murderers elsewhere in Europe while Assange's extradiction case was happening, yet Ny continued to claim it was impossible for her to do so with Assange.
I think Assange was being paranoid, but I also think Ny was letting her own preferences take precedence over pursuing the case as best possible, for whatever her reasons might be (I've in the past suggested that rather than US involvement it's more likely she "just" wanted to make an example of him, but that's pure speculation)
EDIT: Here's a brief news item claiming the above assassin was indicted in absentia: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2003-09-17/man-detained-over-kil...
Here is a more substantial one: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/swedish-police-issue-arrest-...
With regards to the policy change, to some extent I dont care if they apply it consistently to other people now as well. Just that they changed the policy when they were chasing a guy who had pissed of and embarrassed the most powerful nation in the world seems very, well, convenient.
Perhaps more importantly, I'm not sure I am convinced that there has been such a massive policy shift as such. I would like to hear more about these other people that are being chased all around Europe by the Swedish prosecutor authority, but we don't hear about because they are not globally infamous.
I should perhaps add that just because Assange is (possibly) treated differently, this does not prove that there is some conspiracy against him or whatever. This case has gathered a lot of media attention and whatnot. In many ways a conspiracy seems unlikely, or at least unnecessary. Many of the actors involved seems to just follow the path of least resistance and/or acting in their own interest. Sweden does not have much to lose by doing this, certainly relations between US and Sweden are not damaged by this. Marianne Ny seems like a somewhat crazy feminist who IIRC has made statements that the methods she has developed for investigating crimes against women has "good effect on the perpetrator even in those cases where he is not found guilty by a court of law".
Assange wasn't locked in the embassy. He was free (and encouraged by the British, and until they gave up the Swedish) to leave at any time.
Assange chose to stay in the embassy for longer than his likely worst-case sentence, until expelled, in a futile attempt to avoid potential US charges he wasn't then facing and which his decision to delay proceedings so long made actually enabled to come through while he was still in custody following the expiration of Ecuadorian hospitality.
I have in all honestly not followed the Assange case that closely. But my understanding of the situation was that he went to the embassy because he feared he would be extradited to the US and face possible human rights violations if that were the case. Maybe he is de jure "free" to leave the embassy, but it is not as clear that he is de facto free to leave.
Simple example, suppose we just get rid of all the governments etc, and everyone is just "free" to do whatever they want. So in this fantastic world, maybe you are "free" to do whatever you want, but if you do certain things then some big bad guy comes and turns you into minced meat. Are you then "free" to do whatever you want, maybe this can be argued, I am not an expert in philosophy. But if you find it shocking that some (most?) people do not consider this to make you free to do these things, then I'm not sure what to say.
Secondly, you do not allow people to make different interpretations of the situation. You claim that this was a "futile attempt to avoid potential US charges he wasn't then facing", and sure, if you can prove this beyond reasonable doubt then of course there is nothing to discuss here. However, I see no such proof, not even an attempt at such a thing.
More concretely, are you going to tell me with a straight face that if you were in the position of Assange you would without batting an eye just go to Sweden and risk being extradited to the US? Like the US runs Guantanamo, bombs countries left right and center without UN approval, Snowden who exposed government lies and breaking of laws lives in exile, etc. Please note, my point here isn't that the US is terrible or anything, but just that Assange can have a justified fear of being treated poorly there given the circumstances.
So the question isn't really "which way is it", will Assange face human rights violations if he is extradited to the US? Rather the question seems to me to be something like, is it "completly insane" for Assange to think that he might face these violations.
This seems to be more of a minor procedural issue rather than anything meaningful. The court agrees there is probable cause and a flight risk, but denied “detention in absentia” because he’s already in custody.
Quote:
The Court has, at a hearing today, decided that there is probable cause for the suspicion of rape, less serious incident, and that there is a risk that Julian Assange will fail to appear or in some other way avoid participation in the investigation and the following proceedings.
The Court has, however, found that a detention order would not be in accordance with the principle of proportionality. Since Julian Assange is serving a prison sentence the public prosecutor can proceed with the preliminary investigation by issuing a European Investigation Order.
This to me suggest that irrespective of whether or not Assange is guilty, the prosecutor mishandled the cases - parts of the charges had to be dropped because of the statute of limitations because they failed to act while he was in custody in the UK while arguing over something a Swedish judge has now said is not a prerequisite to continuing investigation.
It was highly irregular, and considering how much of police and prosecutor actions in Sweden are based on professional ethics, rather then laws themselves, the level of irregular behavior clearly stands out in this case, as it also did in the pirate bay case, but that's a story for another time. Yes, we really should put more of the rules for police and prosecution into law, there's too much leeway as it is today.
Back to the topic at hand.
Rape cases are usually not public, they almost alwaya are played out without anyone except legal teams, judge, prosecutor, lay judges present. Thus since the trial is in private, and an exoneration in court is then less 'visible' than the public "accusation" cause by naming the suspect, the view is generally that the courts and prosecution should not explicitly name people in the kind of cases you expect to be held in that setting, or in generall - cases where publicly naming suspects can cause undue harm to the suspected regardless of the veracity of the accusations.
It was as far as I can recall still unusual for any accused to be publicly named, much less so for cases expected to be tried behind locked doors. Usually public naming of suspects only happened if the suspect was deemed to be violent enough that the public needed to be warned.