“You stand before me to be sentenced in this criminal action,” Judge Manglona says. “I would note the following: Timing matters. If this case was brought before me some time near 2012, without the benefit of what I know now, that you served a period of imprisonment ... in apparently one of the harshest facilities in the United Kingdom.
“There’s another significant fact – the government has indicated there is no personal victim here. That tells me the dissemination of this information did not result in any known physical injury.
“These two facts are very relevant. I would say if this was still unknown and closer to [2012] I would not be so inclined to accept this plea agreement before me.
“But it’s the year 2024”
She also has to consider the case and seven year imprisonment of Chelsea Manning.
It appears your 62 months ... was fair and reasonable and proportionate to Ms Manning’s actual prison time.
She also acknowledges Assange’s “14-year ordeal”.
“it appears this case ends with me here in Saipan”
“With this pronouncement it appears you will be able to walk out of this courtroom a free man. I hope there will be some peace restored”
#AssangeFree #JournalismIsNotACrime
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The legal arguments in Julian Assange’s High Court extradition hearing on 20-21 February.
Thread:
1. Julian Assange should not be extradited to face prosecution and punishment for his political opinions exposing state criminality.
Assange is being prosecuted for exposing US government criminality including war crimes and torture.
There is extensive evidence of Assange’s political opinions on the importance of transparency in being able to hold governments accountable to deter future abuses.
Extradition for political opinions is not allowed.
The new evidence which emerged since the hearing of the CIA plans to kidnap and/or kill Assange further supports this ground.
2. Julian Assange should not be extradited to face prosecution where the criminal law is being extended in an unprecedented and unforeseeable way.
This is the first time in US history that a publisher has been prosecuted for obtaining or publishing (as opposed to leaking) US state secrets. The drafters of the Espionage Act did not intend for publishers to fall within its ambit, unchallenged expert evidence showed that receipt and publication of state secrets is routine, and that there was an ‘unbroken practice of non-prosecution’ of publishers.
The prosecution ‘crosses a new legal frontier’ and ‘breaks all legal precedents’. Extradition would therefore expose Assange to a novel and unforeseeable extension of criminal law.
To extradite Assange would be a grave violation of Article 7 ECHR.
On this day in 2006 Julian #Assange created @wikileaks.
Julian is 52 now. He was 38 when WikiLeaks published Collateral Murder and was last free. The video shows the US army killing a dozen civilians, including two Reuters employees on assignment and the rescuers who stopped to help the wounded. Reuters formally attempted to obtain the video but the Pentagon refused to hand it over. The evidence of what had happened remained on US military servers until intelligence whistleblower Chelsea Manning sent it to WikiLeaks.
Collateral Murder had a massive impact. The millions of dollars that had been poured into Pentagon PR messaging couldn’t make the public unsee the war crime.
This video of the killing of the good samaritans who stopped to save the severely injured Reuters employee Saeed Chmagh is evidence of the commission of a war crime.
On Monday at 10:45 GMT, the High Court will decide what will happen next in the case of USA v #Assange.
Here's what you need to know.
(Thread:)
On 10 December 2021, the High Court reversed the district judge's earlier decision refusing the US request for #Assange's extradition on the basis that to extradite him would be 'oppressive' (s.91) because it would have a real risk of causing his death.
After ruling in favour of the US, #Assange asked the same High Court judges to certify a number of points of law of general public importance in order to appeal to the Supreme Court. Only if the High Court judges certify at least one can his appeal be sent to the Supreme Court.
BREAKING: The UK High Court will deliver its decision on Monday morning about whether to permit #Assange to appeal the US extradition decision to UK Supreme Court on points of law of general public importance. I'll be there to give a statement. Follow my account for more details.
The judgment will either:
1) Certify that the point(s) of law raised by #Assange are of general public importance--thus giving him permission to lodge an application with the UK Supreme Court; or
(see thread)
Or
2) Deny such certification, in which case the extradition order will pass to UK Home Secretary @PritiPatel to authorise or deny #Assange's extradition.