Merged Julian Assange: rapist or not? - Part 2 / Assange arrested

[Here_to_learn]

Continued from here.

Posted By: LashL

So maybe there wasn't a sealed indicment after all...

Washington Post reports:

The Justice Department has all but concluded it will not bring charges against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange for publishing classified documents because government lawyers said they could not do so without also prosecuting U.S. news organizations and journalists, according to U.S. officials.

[...]
“The problem the department has always had in investigating Julian Assange is there is no way to prosecute him for publishing information without the same theory being applied to journalists,” said former Justice Department spokesman Matthew Miller. “And if you are not going to prosecute journalists for publishing classified information, which the department is not, then there is no way to prosecute Assange.”
[...]
There have been persistent rumors that the grand jury investigation of Assange and WikiLeaks had secretly led to charges. Officials told The Post last week that there was no sealed indictment, and other officials have since come forward to say, as one senior U.S. official put it, that the department has “all but concluded” that it will not bring a case against Assange.

 

[BenBurch]

And in fear of that he has imprisoned himself for longer than he would have been likely to serve on the charges if proven.

 

[theprestige]

And in fear of that he has imprisoned himself for longer than he would have been likely to serve on the charges if proven.

Nah, if he were in fear of a sealed indictment, he would have stayed in Sweden.

 

[BenBurch]

Nah, if he were in fear of a sealed indictment, he would have stayed in Sweden.

Well, you would have to assume more intelligence than I give him credit for, but point taken!

 

[PhantomWolf]

I guess we'll now get to see the mettle of the man, will he keep on hiding and claiming that the US are after him, when it's now clear, as some of us have been saying, that they aren't and can't, or will he step up and face the music for his actions, now both in the UK and Sweden?

I suspect that the answer is that he's going to remain in his self imposed prison cell.

 

[EHocking]

I guess we'll now get to see the mettle of the man,...

I suggest we already have.

 

[BenBurch]

I guess we'll now get to see the mettle of the man, will he keep on hiding and claiming that the US are after him, when it's now clear, as some of us have been saying, that they aren't and can't, or will he step up and face the music for his actions, now both in the UK and Sweden?

I suspect that the answer is that he's going to remain in his self imposed prison cell.

Forever, I sincerely hope.

 

[PhantomWolf]

One does also wonder, if the DoJ actually puts this on the official record and states that they can't and aren't going to charge him, would that mean that Ecuador would no longer be willing to shield him from UK and Swedish Justice?

 

[Mycroft]

Is there anyone left still defending Assange?

 

[EHocking]

Is there anyone left still defending Assange?

"It remains to be seen whether the claims by these unknown, anonymous officials are more than just an attempt to reduce public support for WikiLeaks."

They can't afford to desert their martyr...

 

[Here_to_learn]

So you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again.
The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older,
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death.

Round and round we go....

Today three lawyers for JA wrote an opinion piece in a Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter.

Basically their story is that the investigation in the US is still ongoing and there is a real risk that Sweden would extradite JA to the US.

The also say:

Att USA hotar journalister med årtionden i fängelse eller mer för att de publicerar material som de har fått från sina källor är extremt oroväckande. Att en åklagare i Sverige håller en sådan journalist inspärrad år efter år på en liten ambassad i London (med hjälp av en europeisk arresteringsorder) i stället för att åka dit och förhöra honom är en skandal.

Slutsatsen är att Sverige inte respekterar den asyl som Assange fått (av Ecuador) för att skydda honom från att tillbringa resten av sitt liv i amerikanskt fängelse för sina journalistiska avslöjanden.

My translation:

That the US threatens journalists with decades or more of imprisonment for having received material from their sources is extremely worrying. That a public prosecutor in Sweden holds such a journalist under lock year after year in a small embassy in London (using an EAW) instead of going there to interview him is a scandal.

The conclusion is that Sweden does not respect the asylum that JA has receoved from Ecuador) to protect him from spending the rest of his life in US prison for his journalistic exposures.

So nothing has changed, including the arguments.

 

[Here_to_learn]

http://mobil.dn.se/nyheter/sverige/swedish-detention-order-against-julian-assange-remains/

The Swedish detention order against Julian Assange remains in place according to a ruling by Stockholm District Court at a hearing today. The decision means that the Wikileaks founder must remain at the Ecuadorian embassy in London to avoid being arrested and deported to Sweden.

 

[Here_to_learn]

Press release from the court:

http://www.domstol.se/Om-Sveriges-D...tevaro--Decision-concering-a-detention-order/

 

[The Don]

Press release from the court:

http://www.domstol.se/Om-Sveriges-D...tevaro--Decision-concering-a-detention-order/

Glad to see the Swedish legal system is sticking to its guns

 

[BenBurch]

He'll die in there. Either by his own hand, or of old age.

 

[Sabrina]

Do you know, I hadn't even thought about Assange until this thread got bumped.

So much for him being that important, eh?

 

[tsig]

He'll die in there. Either by his own hand, or of old age.

If he goes back there's at least a chance he might get off, at least he'd have a sentence with an ending, now he's self imprisoned with no end in sight.

 

[BenBurch]

If he goes back there's at least a chance he might get off, at least he'd have a sentence with an ending, now he's self imprisoned with no end in sight.

He likely would have served less time being convicted than he already has.

But forget about international travel after such a conviction.

 

[KDLarsen]

I'll give it a few years before the whole case quietly goes away. The Met are already grumbling about the money spent on keeping watch, and Assange and WikiLeaks are becoming less and less relevant.

Of course, even if Sweden does drop the case against Assange, the UK authorities are still going to want to have a word with Assange over him skipping bail.

 

[BenBurch]

Well, there will be a deception first. They will go away, and Assange will be grabbed on the way to the airport.