Julian Assange: rapist or not?

[Paninaro]

Is English not your first language? Because the evidence is pretty strong that you have no idea what the word "prosecute" actually means.

No, it's not my first language. In Sweden "to prosecute" is equivalent of "väcka åtal" and we're not there yet. As I said this may never go to court at all. This is what some of the controversy has been about all along. These things work a little differently in Sweden vs UK.

 

[Korren]

That's a matter of definition, since no legal system is exactly the same. The point is that Marianne Ny still could come to the same conclusion as Eva Finné did and dismiss the case for the lack of evidence.

Well, granted, but she hasn't yet and the possibility that she might is hardly an argument for the evidence for rape being "very weak" or that "no one has found the evidence strong enough to prosecute yet." Until Assange is physically in Sweden, the Swedish prosecution can't make formal charges, regardless of the strength of the evidence.

 

[uke2se]

No, it's not my first language. In Sweden "to prosecute" is equivalent of "väcka åtal" and we're not there yet. As I said this may never go to court at all. This is what some of the controversy has been about all along. These things work a little differently in Sweden vs UK.

We'll never know until Assange gives himself up.

 

[BenBurch]

We'll never know until Assange gives himself up.

He won't do it voluntarily. But eventually he will be hauled in.

His Ecuadoran angel won't be in office forever.

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

There is an imbalance in your judgment, a blatant double standard, that Assange acolytes share with conspiracy theorist in general.

Even though at least 3 courts has said the evidence in the case establishes that it is more probable that he raped and molested the women than not, and even though Assange ran from the Swedish and the English legal systems, they don't give any credence to it.

That's a nice straw man. Would you care to engage with the actual anti-prosecution arguments, or would you like to keep on talking to yourself? (Following straw and insults snipped).

I find this absolutely fascinating.

There has been a total of three Prosecutors involved, but for some reason one of them is correct, while the other two are wrong.

Oh look, another straw man. I wonder why nobody is engaging with the actual argument, as opposed to making up silly arguments to attack.

Look, I'll spell it out for you so anyone else thinking of trying the same tactic will hopefully think twice.

1a. At least one Swedish prosecutor examined the evidence and decided that the case was not worth pursuing.
1b. Presumably this Swedish prosecutor is not ignorant of the law, ignorant of the facts of the case or irrational.
1c. Therefore it is at the very least a defensible position that the case was not worth pursuing, and anyone accusing people who think the case is not worth pursuing of being ignorant of the law, ignorant of the facts of the case or irrational are both wrong and indulging in ad hominem attacks. You might not agree that bearing everything in mind that the case is not worth pursuing, but if you think no rational person who understands the law and the facts could disagree with you then you are simply, objectively wrong.
1d. You cannot sweep this under the rug by saying "Oh, but these other courts said differently". If the prosecutor was rational and informed at the time she made the original decision, she was rational and informed and subsequent court pronouncements can't change that.

2a. The facts as they are available to us do not resemble anything which could reasonably be described as making up proof beyond reasonable doubt.
2b. There is absolutely no grounds for faith-based belief in "secret evidence", the unfalsifiable catch-all excuse we see so often from blind defenders of judicial error and misconduct.
2c. There are no reasonable grounds to suspect that new, relevant evidence is going to be forthcoming at this stage. There is no murder weapon to find, or surprise witness to be revealed (unless someone was in Assange's closet with a video camera at the time of the alleged offence).
2d. If there is no "secret evidence", and the public evidence does not get anywhere near proof beyond reasonable doubt, and there is no prospect of further evidence emerging, then there cannot be any case against Assange which rises to the level of proof beyond reasonable doubt.
2e. If there is no prospect of proof beyond reasonable doubt emerging, the only obvious reasons to pursue the case seem to be political ones, possibly based on the hope that a miscarriage of justice can be achieved where a jury convicts despite the lack of proof beyond reasonable doubt.

3a. Court pronouncements have no magical effect on reality. Reality is unaffected by whether a claim is endorsed by a guy or a girl in a wig.
3b. Therefore court pronouncements which clash with the available evidence, when there is no good reason to believe "secret evidence" which only the court is privy to exists, should at best be regarded with skepticism.
3c. Anyone who believes court pronouncements over the evidence is failing to exercise competent skepticism. Court opinions are only relevant evidence in cases where we cannot access the information the court has directly - if we can access the same evidence, then there is no rational reason to privilege their opinion over ours unless you think you are a dumb or irrational person.

 

[Here_to_learn]

Oh look, another straw man. I wonder why nobody is engaging with the actual argument, as opposed to making up silly arguments to attack.

Look, I'll spell it out for you so anyone else thinking of trying the same tactic will hopefully think twice.

1a. At least one Swedish prosecutor examined the evidence and decided that the case was not worth pursuing.

Correct, with the qualifier that it was the evidence available at the time[/quote]

1b. Presumably this Swedish prosecutor is not ignorant of the law, ignorant of the facts of the case or irrational.

Correct, although exactly the same thing is true for the other two prosecutors. And we know that the last prosecutors special area of competence is sexual crimes.

1c. Therefore it is at the very least a defensible position that the case was not worth pursuing, and anyone accusing people who think the case is not worth pursuing of being ignorant of the law, ignorant of the facts of the case or irrational are both wrong and indulging in ad hominem attacks. You might not agree that bearing everything in mind that the case is not worth pursuing, but if you think no rational person who understands the law and the facts could disagree with you then you are simply, objectively wrong.

Who in this thread understands Swedish law? Who in this thread has referred to Swedish law and to the basis (förarbete) of the relevant laws when coming to the conclusion that it is not worth pursuing? Who has analysed previous the way the higher courts has ruled in Sweden on admissible evidence?

1d. You cannot sweep this under the rug by saying "Oh, but these other courts said differently". If the prosecutor was rational and informed at the time she made the original decision, she was rational and informed and subsequent court pronouncements can't change that.

Still based on that the courts would have made their decision based on the same set of facts as the prosecutor did.

2a. The facts as they are available to us do not resemble anything which could reasonably be described as making up proof beyond reasonable doubt.

That's obviously your claim.

2b. There is absolutely no grounds for faith-based belief in "secret evidence", the unfalsifiable catch-all excuse we see so often from blind defenders of judicial error and misconduct.

We know for a fact that JAs legal defense team has complained that they have not been provided access to the full investigation. We do know what they have give access to, since they leaked police documents.

2c. There are no reasonable grounds to suspect that new, relevant evidence is going to be forthcoming at this stage. There is no murder weapon to find, or surprise witness to be revealed (unless someone was in Assange's closet with a video camera at the time of the alleged offence).

Agree.

2d. If there is no "secret evidence", and the public evidence does not get anywhere near proof beyond reasonable doubt, and there is no prospect of further evidence emerging, then there cannot be any case against Assange which rises to the level of proof beyond reasonable doubt.

Ah, but here again it's your claim that it does not go beyond reasonable doubt. But still, what about the courts? It's the courts that make the decision, not a forum poster, and the courts so far has found enough to allow for the EAW. And those that made the decisions know and are trained in Swedish law, which is what the case would be decided on.

2e. If there is no prospect of proof beyond reasonable doubt emerging, the only obvious reasons to pursue the case seem to be political ones, possibly based on the hope that a miscarriage of justice can be achieved where a jury convicts despite the lack of proof beyond reasonable doubt.

There is no jury for a criminal case in Sweden. Get your facts correct.

3a. Court pronouncements have no magical effect on reality. Reality is unaffected by whether a claim is endorsed by a guy or a girl in a wig.
3b. Therefore court pronouncements which clash with the available evidence, when there is no good reason to believe "secret evidence" which only the court is privy to exists, should at best be regarded with skepticism.
3c. Anyone who believes court pronouncements over the evidence is failing to exercise competent skepticism. Court opinions are only relevant evidence in cases where we cannot access the information the court has directly - if we can access the same evidence, then there is no rational reason to privilege their opinion over ours unless you think you are a dumb or irrational person.

So to spell it out:

1. Check the dates on when EF dismissed the case, and when the different interviews were held. Did EF have the same information as MN and the courts had?
2. When talking about legal cases, all decisions are based on the law. In Sweden, this means that the actual law, the prework to the law (förarbete), as well as earlier relevant cases all affect what constitutes the definition of for example rape, what evidence is accepted, in what extent interviews are considered trustworthy and so on. So I fully agree that someone in this thread could analyse the information what we have today and come to a decision, but that information is not just what is in the leaked documents.

The courts cannot decide is something is 100% true. As we all know, witness testimony can be very unreliable, evidence can be tampered with or missed, the involved persons may lie and so on. It's an unfortunate fact that based on this, we will never know what happened. The best we will have is the decision of the legal system - a system that we have set it place to try to be an impartial judge to try to get as close to knowing as is possible.

Since the accusations are based on Swedish law, this means they have to be analysed according to Swedish law, and Swedish law practice, since that is what will decide the case in the end. (If it ever gets there...)

As I have stated before, I do not claim to be competent to make that analysis, I do not have the legal training to know how laws are interpreted, and I do not have access previous cases to know how Swedish courts in general decide on cases like this. Now, all that information is available. It was available to the prosecutors and to the courts, and it their responsibilities to take that information into account when they make their decisions.

But thanks to the Swedish laws on information access, anyone can request that information, and do the work themselves. I would be very interested in reading such an analysis.

 

[PhantomWolf]

2d. If there is no "secret evidence", and the public evidence does not get anywhere near proof beyond reasonable doubt, and there is no prospect of further evidence emerging, then there cannot be any case against Assange which rises to the level of proof beyond reasonable doubt.

Funny thing, the Interrogation is about interviewing Assange to see what new evidence they can get from him. If he says that a) Sophie was asleep when he started the sex, and b) he knew she had not consented to sex without a condom, but rather specifially forbade it, then reasonable doubt is gone.

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

Funny thing, the Interrogation is about interviewing Assange to see what new evidence they can get from him. If he says that a) Sophie was asleep when he started the sex, and b) he knew she had not consented to sex without a condom, but rather specifially forbade it, then reasonable doubt is gone.

Anything possible, but given that he's got plenty of good legal advice I think that's a terribly slender hope to base a rather expensive and public pursuit upon. If all Assange has to do in order to walk away a free man is say "that's not how I remember it", and you know Assange knows that, I don't think the odds of him handing the prosecution a case are all that high, do you?

 

[PhantomWolf]

Anything possible, but given that he's got plenty of good legal advice I think that's a terribly slender hope to base a rather expensive and public pursuit upon. If all Assange has to do in order to walk away a free man is say "that's not how I remember it", and you know Assange knows that, I don't think the odds of him handing the prosecution a case are all that high, do you?

Except that he has already had one interview and we don't know what he said. He might have forgotten by now too. Cops are pretty good at trapping people in lies and inconsistancies in interrogations, and besides, if he thinks the same as some here, he'd probably free free to admit it because he wouldn't consider it a crime.

 

[Kaosium]

Except that he has already had one interview and we don't know what he said. He might have forgotten by now too. Cops are pretty good at trapping people in lies and inconsistancies in interrogations, and besides, if he thinks the same as some here, he'd probably free free to admit it because he wouldn't consider it a crime.

If he's forgotten, he could probably refresh his memory here.



Incidentally, something I forgot to include in my post regarding the British court, remember this poor guy? Convicted of murder in absentia by an Italian court for a murder in Italy and sentenced to sixteen years in prison when he had 'cast iron evidence' he was in Staffordshire at the time? Spent six weeks in prison and then another year trying to straighten it out? Here's some choice quotes if you don't want to read the article:

“I had overwhelming evidence that I could not have committed the crime yet they didn’t care. All they cared about was following the procedures of the arrest warrant, and I spent six weeks in jail as a result."

Now Mr Arapi, an Albanian national who is married to a British woman and has lived in the UK for ten years, wants to highlight what he sees as the unfairness of the European Arrest Warrant system, which, critics say, forces the UK to extradite its own citizens even in cases where the evidence is flimsy.

<...>

But when Italy’s extradition request was considered at Westminster Magistrates’ Court in April, magistrates did not examine the evidence. They simply checked that the paperwork for the warrant had been filed correctly.

Pudding-eating surrender poodles are only interested in pleasing their EAW masters, they weren't about to let this poor guy off until the Italians admitted to the mistake, thus the records showing he was in Staffordshire that day meant no more to them than the exculpatory evidence in the full statements did for Julian Assange.

 

[BenBurch]

I really like all you guys telling Sweden how their justice system works. Without you, whatever would they do?

 

[eirik]

Anything possible, but given that he's got plenty of good legal advice I think that's a terribly slender hope to base a rather expensive and public pursuit upon. If all Assange has to do in order to walk away a free man is say "that's not how I remember it", and you know Assange knows that, I don't think the odds of him handing the prosecution a case are all that high, do you?

If all he has to do to get off the rape charges is to lie about them - doesn't that bother you a little bit? Morally, I mean? Or is all good as long as he wins?

In the real world, most people find it very hard to lie to courts, and it's a high risk. (Then again, most people don't even rape or molest women.)

That's why Assange has made his own prison in the Ecuadorian embassy.

 

[The Big Dog]

If he's forgotten, he could probably refresh his memory here.

Incidentally, regarding the British court, remember this poor guy? Convicted of murder in absentia by an Italian court for a murder in Italy and sentenced to sixteen years in prison when he had 'cast iron evidence' he was in Staffordshire at the time? Spent six weeks in prison and then another year trying to straighten it out? Here's some choice quotes if you don't want to read the article:


Pudding-eating surrender poodles are only interested in pleasing their EAW masters, they weren't about to let this poor guy off until the Italians admitted to the mistake, thus the records showing he was in Staffordshire that day meant no more to them than the exculpatory evidence in the full statements did for Julian Assange.

Makes a note that an anecdote now constitutes data.

Shut down the extradition system.

 

[uke2se]

What do court cases in Italy have to do with the Swedish judiciary system? Italy is pretty far from Sweden, a lot worse off on the corruption index, and a completely different system.

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

If all he has to do to get off the rape charges is to lie about them - doesn't that bother you a little bit? Morally, I mean? Or is all good as long as he wins?

Surprise, surprise. Yet another offensive straw man. Doesn't that bother you a bit? Morally, I mean? Or is it all good as long as you are fighting for a righteous cause?

Isn't it a little bit dishonest to try to twist "there is insufficient evidence to show Assange is guilty beyond reasonable doubt, and the fantasy that he'd incriminate himself despite legal advice is highly implausible" into "Assange is guilty but he can lie his way out of it - hurray!"?

If you can't engage with what I actually said honestly, you can always just not hit the "Submit Reply" button.

In the real world, most people find it very hard to lie to courts, and it's a high risk.

Is that based on anything scientific? Or is this just something you'd like to believe? A large part of why you hire a lawyer is for them to tell you what's strategically advantageous to say in court. A layperson with no legal advisor would be taking a huge risk by lying in court, but that's not the situation here.

That's why Assange has made his own prison in the Ecuadorian embassy.

If you have mind reading powers, run along and win the million. If not, making things up won't help your argument.

Except that he has already had one interview and we don't know what he said. He might have forgotten by now too. Cops are pretty good at trapping people in lies and inconsistancies in interrogations

That is why any lawyer worth their salt will tell you to say "I don't recall", because even totally innocent people (and before the straw man brigade start up again, I'm not claiming to know whether Assange is innocent) can get tripped up by their own faulty memories and made to look guilty.

One of the absurd fictions of the adversarial court system is that people's oral statements made months after the events are somehow more reliable than statements recorded promptly after the events. Human memory just doesn't work that way - it's terrible in the short term and worse in the long term.

, and besides, if he thinks the same as some here, he'd probably free free to admit it because he wouldn't consider it a crime.

Are you unaware that he has people called "lawyers" who advise him on the law? I realise that it's a lovely fantasy for people who have already convinced themselves that Assange is guilty that Assange would roll over and incriminate himself, but whether he's innocent or guilty he's had ample time to figure out a story that doesn't incriminate him under Swedish law.

 

[uke2se]

there is insufficient evidence to show Assange is guilty beyond reasonable doubt, and the fantasy that he'd incriminate himself despite legal advice is highly implausible

How
do
you
know
this?

Are you a judge and have you had access to all the case evidence?

If not, why do you presume to understand this better than the experts with all the information, all in order to declare someone innocent before the trial?

 

[Kaosium]

Makes a note that an anecdote now constitutes data.

Shut down the extradition system.

Ummm...that's not an anecdote, it is data, didn't you read the article? Do you understand the difference? Here's another one I posted earlier. It's not extradition anymore, it's a surrender agreement, like the High Court said in their judgment:

The purpose of the Framework Decision, as set out in the recitals to the Framework Decision and the EU Commission's Explanatory Memorandum (2001/0215 dated 25 September 2001) was to replace the European Extradition Convention of 1957 and other Conventions by a new regime. The new regime was to be a regime for surrender between judicial authorities founded on the basis of the common area for justice and the principle of mutual recognition of judicial decisions and judgments as "the cornerstone of judicial co-operation in both civil and criminal matters". Recital (5) stated:

"The objective set for the Union to become an area of freedom, security and justice leads to abolishing extradition between Member States and replacing it by a system of surrender between judicial authorities. Further, the introduction of a new simplified system of surrender of sentenced or suspected persons for the purposes of execution or prosecution of criminal sentences makes it possible to remove the complexity and potential for delay inherent in the present extradition procedures. Traditional cooperation relations which have prevailed up till now between Member States should be replaced by a system of free movement of judicial decisions in criminal matters. covering both pre-sentence and final decisions, within an area of freedom, security and justice."​

It was intended to make a break with the previous regime which had been intergovernmental and replace it with a regime where:

"Each national and judicial authority should ipso facto recognise requests for the surrender of a person made by the judicial authority of a Member State with a minimum of formalities." (Paragraph 2 of the Explanatory Memorandum)

So it's more like being transferred from one state in the US to another, actually it might be easier as I think in the US one has to actually be charged, unlike this instance. Anyway, you can feel how you like about it, it can have its advantages or disadvantages, I was just pointing out that it's not like they examine evidence, or it's like an extradition agreement outside the EU: it's a surrender agreement.

 

[tsig]

That's a nice straw man. Would you care to engage with the actual anti-prosecution arguments, or would you like to keep on talking to yourself? (Following straw and insults snipped).




Oh look, another straw man. I wonder why nobody is engaging with the actual argument, as opposed to making up silly arguments to attack.

Look, I'll spell it out for you so anyone else thinking of trying the same tactic will hopefully think twice.

1a. At least one Swedish prosecutor examined the evidence and decided that the case was not worth pursuing.
1b. Presumably this Swedish prosecutor is not ignorant of the law, ignorant of the facts of the case or irrational.
1c. Therefore it is at the very least a defensible position that the case was not worth pursuing, and anyone accusing people who think the case is not worth pursuing of being ignorant of the law, ignorant of the facts of the case or irrational are both wrong and indulging in ad hominem attacks. You might not agree that bearing everything in mind that the case is not worth pursuing, but if you think no rational person who understands the law and the facts could disagree with you then you are simply, objectively wrong.
1d. You cannot sweep this under the rug by saying "Oh, but these other courts said differently". If the prosecutor was rational and informed at the time she made the original decision, she was rational and informed and subsequent court pronouncements can't change that.

2a. The facts as they are available to us do not resemble anything which could reasonably be described as making up proof beyond reasonable doubt.
2b. There is absolutely no grounds for faith-based belief in "secret evidence", the unfalsifiable catch-all excuse we see so often from blind defenders of judicial error and misconduct.
2c. There are no reasonable grounds to suspect that new, relevant evidence is going to be forthcoming at this stage. There is no murder weapon to find, or surprise witness to be revealed (unless someone was in Assange's closet with a video camera at the time of the alleged offence).
2d. If there is no "secret evidence", and the public evidence does not get anywhere near proof beyond reasonable doubt, and there is no prospect of further evidence emerging, then there cannot be any case against Assange which rises to the level of proof beyond reasonable doubt.
2e. If there is no prospect of proof beyond reasonable doubt emerging, the only obvious reasons to pursue the case seem to be political ones, possibly based on the hope that a miscarriage of justice can be achieved where a jury convicts despite the lack of proof beyond reasonable doubt.

3a. Court pronouncements have no magical effect on reality. Reality is unaffected by whether a claim is endorsed by a guy or a girl in a wig.
3b. Therefore court pronouncements which clash with the available evidence, when there is no good reason to believe "secret evidence" which only the court is privy to exists, should at best be regarded with skepticism.
3c. Anyone who believes court pronouncements over the evidence is failing to exercise competent skepticism. Court opinions are only relevant evidence in cases where we cannot access the information the court has directly - if we can access the same evidence, then there is no rational reason to privilege their opinion over ours unless you think you are a dumb or irrational person.

Do you think he should return to Sweden?

 

[tsig]

If he's forgotten, he could probably refresh his memory here.



Incidentally, something I forgot to include in my post regarding the British court, remember this poor guy? Convicted of murder in absentia by an Italian court for a murder in Italy and sentenced to sixteen years in prison when he had 'cast iron evidence' he was in Staffordshire at the time? Spent six weeks in prison and then another year trying to straighten it out? Here's some choice quotes if you don't want to read the article:





Pudding-eating surrender poodles are only interested in pleasing their EAW masters, they weren't about to let this poor guy off until the Italians admitted to the mistake, thus the records showing he was in Staffordshire that day meant no more to them than the exculpatory evidence in the full statements did for Julian Assange.

Guess I missed Namecalling 101 in debate class.

 

[Kaosium]

Guess I missed Namecalling 101 in debate class.

Err...that was a joke, styled along the lines of 'cheese-eating surrender monkeys' and perhaps I forgot the smiley because I read something about this on the front page of the Wisconsin State Journal:

LONDON — Avert your eyes, Wisconsinites. Britain wants to kill badgers.

Animal rights activists are battling the country's cattle farmers in a bid to save Britain's native burrowers from a government-authorized cull.