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Legal myths about the Assange extradition

newstatesman.com

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Re: Legal myths about the Assange extradition

#21

Post by TazeTSchnitzel »

tptacek wrote: post #14
option_greek wrote: post #12

Would any one really trust the due course of law argument after the Kim Dotcom incident. Basically it can now be argued that the US can get who ever it wants from where ever they are for what ever their crimes are.

That being the case, what does it matter what country Assange is in? If it's all the same be he in New Zealand, Sweden, or the UK, shouldn't he be required to face charges in Sweden?

One possible explanation is it would be harder to fight US extradition if he's under arrest in Sweden or jailed.

Re: Legal myths about the Assange extradition

#22

Post by jlgreco »

tptacek wrote: post #13
icebraining wrote: post #10

“By giving Assange asylum, Ecuador is protecting freedom of the press” This is perhaps the strangest proposition. / Ecuador has a woeful record on freedom of the press. The proposition doesn't actually say that protecting the freedom of the press is their motivation . Good things can arise from bad motives.

This article isn't laying out a coherent argument for Assange's extradition; that's not its point. The point of the article is to catalog common misconceptions about the legal issues arising from the Assange drama. The "courage" of Ecuador in offering asylum to Assange is one of those misconceptions.

"The "courage" of Ecuador in offering asylum to Assange is one of those misconceptions."

That may very well be a misconception, but I am not sure I see how it is a legal misconception.

Re: Legal myths about the Assange extradition

#23

Post by brudgers »

The article fails to point out that there is substantial precedent for the UK to ignore extradition requests by other EU members. Augusto Pinochet is perhaps an obvious example.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indictment_and_arrest_of_August...

Although I am loathe to rank vile behavior in general, crimes against humanity would seem to demand more careful consideration during extradition proceedings than the allegations against Mr. Assange.

Re: Legal myths about the Assange extradition

#24

Post by tomelders »

cube13 wrote: post #18
philwelch wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not extradition, that's extraordinary rendition, an extrajudicial process. It's always illegal. And while it's a worrying thing, it would be very odd if that was an option on the table for Assange, if only because they could have done it before, and can still do it just as easily from the UK, or actual Ecuadorian soil for that matter, than from Sweden. Assange is too much of a high profile target for rendition…

That's what bothers me about the "Sweden will send him to the US" argument. I don't get why he's concerned about it, AND(at the same time) is in the UK, who, out of any country in the world, is quite possibly the MOST likely to agree to a US extradition request.

Not really. Britain's extradition agreement with the US is tougher than Sweden's. Britain can not extradite to the US where there's the possibility of a death sentence. The charges the US want to introduce would most likely come under the espionage act and he could face the death penalty.

Plus, public support for Assange is greater in the UK than in Sweden. Even if the request were successful, which is unlikely, it would take almost a decade, if not longer.

Re: Legal myths about the Assange extradition

#25

Post by tptacek »

TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #21
tptacek wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That being the case, what does it matter what country Assange is in? If it's all the same be he in New Zealand, Sweden, or the UK, shouldn't he be required to face charges in Sweden?

One possible explanation is it would be harder to fight US extradition if he's under arrest in Sweden or jailed.

See rest of thread. The whole article is about refuting that idea (/"misconception").

Re: Legal myths about the Assange extradition

#26

Post by thom »

marvin wrote: post #16

I don't want to be a tinfoil hat conspiracy nut and make unsubstantiated claims here, so I'm a bit hesitant to voice these thoughts. But legal issues or not: You need to have blind trust in the well-meaning efforts of national governments to believe that there aren't larger forces at work here than Swedish prosecutors wanting to charge Assange with rape. This is not the kind of high-profile violent crime that would l…

As a general gauge, I think a lot of people are hugely offended by the idea that some forms of non-consensual sex aren't rape.

Re: Legal myths about the Assange extradition

#27

Post by citricsquid »

marvin wrote: post #16

I don't want to be a tinfoil hat conspiracy nut and make unsubstantiated claims here, so I'm a bit hesitant to voice these thoughts. But legal issues or not: You need to have blind trust in the well-meaning efforts of national governments to believe that there aren't larger forces at work here than Swedish prosecutors wanting to charge Assange with rape. This is not the kind of high-profile violent crime that would l…

> This is not the kind of high-profile violent crime that would lead to an international manhunt through Interpol.

This is not a "normal" crime situation, as a commenter put it yesterday: no embassy would normally grant a third party protection when there is an arrest warrant for rape involved, nor would this situation "normally" have so much media attention. Replace Assange with someone else equally as politically relevant (say G .W. Bush) and the situation would be identical.

> In the interest of gauging people's opinions, does anyone disagree with this particular point?

This article explicitly states that Assange is just as safe in Sweden from America (if not more so) as he is in England. He chose to stay in England until an arrest warrant was issued; if he believed his life was in danger why was he happy to stay in England until the arrest warrant? Why didn't he flee before? If Sweden is willing to disregard all their laws to extradite him why didn't England?

His behaviour seems like the behaviour of someone that wants to avoid being taken to the place that he is wanted for arrest and that the wikileaks involvement is one big cover, the reasons relating to Wikileaks have been shown in articles like this to be irrelevant, articles like this have shown that the supposed concerns are not legitimate, so the only conclusion I can come to is either Assange believes he is going to be found guilty of his supposed crime, or that he thinks Sweden is willing to break lots of laws that England aren't willing to break, yet this article again shows that is very unlikely.

His behaviour is inconsistent, therefore I am not 100% sure that this is all one big play to get him to America to be murdered. I think it's just as likely that his "fame" is the problem.

> The Swedish government could guarantee that Assange wouldn't be extradited, but it would make them look bad in the eyes of the US and others. So clearly they won't.

The article explains that they can't make that promise and it also explains why such concerns are of little relevance.

Re: Legal myths about the Assange extradition

#28

Post by tptacek »

marvin wrote: post #16

I don't want to be a tinfoil hat conspiracy nut and make unsubstantiated claims here, so I'm a bit hesitant to voice these thoughts. But legal issues or not: You need to have blind trust in the well-meaning efforts of national governments to believe that there aren't larger forces at work here than Swedish prosecutors wanting to charge Assange with rape. This is not the kind of high-profile violent crime that would l…

The Swedish government cannot guarantee Assange won't be extradited; it falls on the Swedish judicial system to do that.

Your comment again puts forward the idea that the political forces aligned against Assange are so great that no amount of critical thinking, due process, or countervailing concern for the rights of victims can apply: it is, to use your word, "obvious" that the case isn't about "rape", but about an undocumented (and undisclosed) but nevertheless clear and immediate effort to haul Assange to the US and try him with espionage. No court in Europe seems to view the situation that way.

Regardless, that concern has very little to do with this particular article, which catalogs and rebuts specific "misconceptions" about the legal issues faced by Assange. Those rebuttals are either compelling or they're not. What do you think about them?

Re: Legal myths about the Assange extradition

#29

Post by mattvanhorn »

Now that we know Karl Rove is advising the Swedish government in the prosecution of Assange, I think it is completely reasonable to assume the worst with regard to Sweden's intentions about extraditing.

I think this article makes a much more convincing argument about what is going on than the one in the post: http://markcrispinmiller.com/2011/02/eight-big-problems-with...

Re: Legal myths about the Assange extradition

#30

Post by tptacek »

tomelders wrote: post #24
cube13 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what bothers me about the "Sweden will send him to the US" argument. I don't get why he's concerned about it, AND(at the same time) is in the UK, who, out of any country in the world, is quite possibly the MOST likely to agree to a US extradition request.

Not really. Britain's extradition agreement with the US is tougher than Sweden's. Britain can not extradite to the US where there's the possibility of a death sentence. The charges the US want to introduce would most likely come under the espionage act and he could face the death penalty. Plus, public support for Assange is greater in the UK than in Sweden. Even if the request were successful, which is unlikely, it w…

No, this is just completely wrong. Sweden, under the ECHR, cannot extradite people to face the death penalty either.
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