Anyone know why they dropped it?
"*The woman of whom Mr. Assange is accused of the offence
of "lesser rape" (a technical term in Swedish law) sent an
SMS to a friend saying that she "did not want to accuse JA
[of] anything" and "it was the police who made up the
charges". The other woman tweeted in 2013 that she had
never been raped. Both women’s testimonies say that they
consented to the sex. A senior prosecutor already dismissed
the ’rape’ accusation, saying that there were no grounds
for accusing Mr. Assange on this basis. But a third
prosecutor, lobbied by a politician who was running for
attorney general, took over the investigation and
resurrected the accusations against Mr. Assange.* [1]"
It stretches credulity to argue that responsibility for the affair lies more with the "big powers" than the decision of two apparently major fans to report him to the police after comparing notes on his sexual behaviour. And suggesting the "bad apple" most at fault for the whole affair is somehow the second prosecutor to look at the case is just unhinged.
Ultimately it was pursued then dropped then pursued then dropped because murky allegations of sexual impropriety are difficult to make up stand up in court, even when the alleged perpetrator isn't an articulate celebrity with an excellent defence team and the accusers desperately want him off the streets. If the state wanted to railroad Assange, he'd have been in jail a lot quicker on much more straightforward charges without the opportunity to change jurisdictions and identify new angles to try to dismiss the whole thing on a technicality.
You mean the politician-lawyer Claes Borgstrom who was subsequently fired by the woman in question because he wasn't representing her and "he just wanted to be attached to a high profile case"?
Yeah, nothing suspicious about that.
>It stretches credulity to argue that responsibility for the affair lies more with the "big powers" than the decision of two apparently major fans to report him to the police
"They are trying to arrest him on suspicion of XYZ … It is definitely a fit-up… Their timings are too convenient right after Cablegate." -- GCHQ officer, "straining credulity" with their wacky conspiracy theory.
>And suggesting the "bad apple" most at fault for the whole affair is somehow the second prosecutor to look at the case is just unhinged.
Because cases being dropped and then picked up again suddenly by people much higher up the political food chain isn't at all suspicious. That's just unhinged...
>If the state wanted to railroad Assange, he'd have been in jail a lot quicker on much more straightforward charges
Aside from the whole "first amendment" problem which prevented the straightforward charges, rape is a much better charge than treason if you can make it stick. It kills his credibility and prevents him from being martyred (like happened to Chelsea Manning).
No. I mean Elizabeth Massi Fritz, the lawyer who is currently making statements on their behalf that it is "a scandal that a suspected rapist can avoid the judicial system and thus avoid a trial in court" and that despite the prosecutor's latest decision her client "can't change her view that Assange has exposed her to a rape", having frequently issued statements calling for a trial over the past few years.
The fact they sacked Borgstrom and hired someone else to continue to pursue the case against Assange actually undermines the Assangist theory that actually the whole thing was a conspiracy by the authorities that his accusers had no agency in.
Yes, it is entirely unhinged (or staggeringly ignorant of how legal systems work) to suggest that a case based entirely on apparently-reluctant witness testimony being reopened on appeal by a more senior prosecutor after an appeal from the hitherto-reluctant accusers' lawyer and interview with the suspect is more likely to be evidence of a conspiracy than a properly functioning legal system.
The thing being a conspiracy and his accusers having agency in it, are orthogonal matters.
OTOH, it stretches my credulity that the decision lies to the actual fans, with no external motive/pressure on them.
>If the state wanted to railroad Assange, he'd have been in jail a lot quicker on much more straightforward charges
Yes, but character assassination works better even if you have no real charges. It even keeps working after/if one is cleared...
Such as?
If a government conspiracy really wants someone in jail, it's a lot easier to make a proper false allegation - of pretty much any sort - with evidence under their control rather than try to force an existing totally unexpected and rather wobbly one to stand up.
On the other hand, prosecutors and police investigators regularly have differences in opinions about the merits of pursuing borderline sexual misconduct or domestic violence accusations with unenthusiastic witnesses without any semblance of a conspiracy whatsoever.
I mean, I know the US burned a lot of international goodwill invading a country (Iraq) that was completely un-involved with the attack on false pretenses (weapons of mass destruction) while ignoring the mastermind (bin Laden) for a decade, all the while more-or-less flaunting an illegal off-shore prison where hundreds of people, some of whom were definitely innocent and many of whom weren't particularly guilty, in inhuman conditions, but try to remember what things were like immediately after the attacks.
Back in 2001-2003, America was still the good guys, and we'd just had two 100-story skyscrapers in our largest city destroyed in a morning, with thousands of people killed. Hell, at the time we thought it was tens of thousands. Other countries - Sweden and Italy and everyone else - weren't bending over backwards to help us extraordinarily rend people because the CIA has magic powers and can do anything they want, anywhere they want. They were complying because, well, shit, 9/11.
You could very well argue that Bin Laden won, especially because I highly doubt a guy like Trump would be able to win the presidency if 9/11 never happened and Trump is doing more damage to the United States' interests at home and abroad than the last 6 presidents combined.
All that's still missing is a war.
Defence laywer Per E Samuelsson identifies two reasons to why the charges were dropped: – He had a solid explanation to what really happened that night. Which means the prosecutor can't expect a conviction in court. Secondly, we can prove that the US is after him. Proof which we didn't have when the Supreme Court tested this in 2015.
So why not go to court with it? He believes Sweden would have handed him over for extradition?
EDIT: Marianne Ny has been a subject of heavy criticism in Sweden for her handling of the Assange case (primarily for refusing to take his statement remotely, and claiming his fears for extradition to nothing more than conspiracy theories).
Correction: 23 minutes from now, thanks svip