4 ms·

>What's with the downvotes? Can I hear a different opinion? Sure, completely without any connection to any opinions on whether Assange should be tried or not,

by xoa 8y ago

>What's with the downvotes? Can I hear a different opinion? Sure, completely without any connection to any opinions on whether Assange should be tried or not, or any of the politics, the parent is engaging in some real silliness/ignorance, and that shouldn't be upvoted on HN even if it agrees with your politics. In particular: It certainly didn't take the government 8 years to investigate this, this is obviously a politically motivated prosecution. These don't follow. No, it didn't take the government 8 years to investigate this, but that's not relevant either. The government can perfectly well find all the evidence they need, but if they're simply physically unable to get at the suspect they can then sit on the case as long as any applicable statute of limitations hasn't run out (and not everything has a statute of limitations). They may choose not to prosecute for various reasons, including simple lack of resources or impossibility. But none of this at all bars them, either legally or morally in my opinion, from later attempting a prosecution if the opportunity ever allows. That does not make it "obviously a politically motivated prosecution", nor is it unheard of even in very serious cases like terrorism bombings, murder, and so forth. Some people are very good at evasion and hiding, but the true government superpower is patience. They file it away, but they don't forget. They'll just wait, but that doesn't mean a crime goes away unless there is a statute of limitations that explicitly makes it go away eventually by law. If parent poster wants to make a case for universal expiration, that any crime should cease to be prosecutable if it goes cold or suspects can stay away for long enough, then they should just do so. There is genuinely a real argument to be made there. But a suspect being granted protection by another country and then the government just waiting, and then the wheels grinding into motion once again if the opportunity ever allows, is not by itself some weird thing. It doesn't justify the hysteria, nor the call for people to give him money.

ryanlol 8y ago
>The government can perfectly well find all the evidence they need, but if they're simply physically unable to get at the suspect they can then sit on the case as long as any applicable statute of limitations hasn't run out Why did they not indict him before 2018? I don't think that has anything to do with the US government being physically unable to get to him. It's not normal procedure to delay indictment, the normal procedure is to keep the indictment sealed. Obama DOJ had decided to not indict Assange for this, this is a politically motivated prosecution by the Trump administration. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/julian-assange-unlikely-to-face-us-charges-over-publishing-classified-documents/2013/11/25/dd27decc-55f1-11e3-8304-caf30787c0a9_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/julia... >Justice officials said they looked hard at Assange but realized that they have what they described as a “New York Times problem.” If the Justice Department indicted Assange, it would also have to prosecute the New York Times and other news organizations and writers who published classified material, including The Washington Post and Britain’s Guardian newspaper. Everyone who follows WL already knew about this hash thing in 2011, it was brought up in detail during the Manning trial. The DOJ was well aware of the possibility of indicting Assange over this, but opted to not do so until recently. >If parent poster wants to make a case for universal expiration, that any crime should cease to be prosecutable if it goes cold or suspects can stay away for long enough This has nothing at all to do with what I'm saying. I'm saying that DOJ flipflopping on this indicates that this was a politically motivated decision.
- franey 8y ago
  You're conflating two different things: publishing classified material, which the DOJ under Obama didn't charge, and a CFAA violation. Assange is getting charged for a CFAA violation. "Hacking" isn't a great description of what the law forbids. It forbids obtaining information by "intentionally access[ing] a computer without authorization or exceed[ing] authorized access". https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1030 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1030
  - ryanlol 8y ago
    >You're conflating two different things: publishing classified material, which the DOJ under Obama didn't charge, and a CFAA violation. I am not. This CFAA violation has been publicly discussed for 8 years now, I know exactly what I mean. The idea of indicting Assange for publishing classified material has always been a weird conspiracy theory.
- xoa 8y ago
  >Why did they not indict him before 2018? Could be they just saw no reason to bother because there was no possibility of getting him. There is no requirement to indict someone immediately upon collecting evidence, indictment is merely the formal accusation of a felony issued by a grand jury. I don't understand why some of you seem to consider this some wild thing. Furthermore, even if they had all this evidence nobody may have sat down and come up with a legal theory sufficiently tailored, and in fact you yourself raise this in the rest of your post: >Obama DOJ had decided to not indict Assange for this, this is a politically motivated prosecution by the Trump administration. Your source does not support this leap. In fact quite the contrary: >Justice officials said they looked hard at Assange but realized that they have what they described as a “New York Times problem.” If the Justice Department indicted Assange, it would also have to prosecute the New York Times and other news organizations and writers who published classified material, including The Washington Post and Britain’s Guardian newspaper. Your quote doesn't even make sense exactly because prosecutors never "have to prosecute" anything. But that aside, what we see now is that they haven't indicted him for "publishing classified material" or anything like that, they've found a genuine potential crime (if proven) that is about direct material aid provided by Assange alone. Going after publishing would invite all sorts of 1A arguments and would probably fail unless the papers were directly involved. But unless the NYT and others were in direct contact with Manning and trying to help her break through government security themselves, this charge doesn't in any way involve them. I mean, you do see how your own accusations here are symmetric right? Someone could just as well argue that it was Obama making a politically motivated decision not to indict, though I think that'd be a silly argument too. Ask "if at some point in the last 7 years Assange had suddenly voluntarily left and returned directly to the USA and announced he was willing to face whatever they would bring, would the US have then prosecuted or not?"

by xoa 8y ago

ryanlol 8y ago

>The government can perfectly well find all the evidence they need, but if they're simply physically unable to get at the suspect they can then sit on the case as long as any applicable statute of limitations hasn't run out Why did they not indict him before 2018? I don't think that has anything to do with the US government being physically unable to get to him. It's not normal procedure to delay indictment, the normal procedure is to keep the indictment sealed. Obama DOJ had decided to not indict Assange for this, this is a politically motivated prosecution by the Trump administration. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/julian-assange-unlikely-to-face-us-charges-over-publishing-classified-documents/2013/11/25/dd27decc-55f1-11e3-8304-caf30787c0a9_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/julia... >Justice officials said they looked hard at Assange but realized that they have what they described as a “New York Times problem.” If the Justice Department indicted Assange, it would also have to prosecute the New York Times and other news organizations and writers who published classified material, including The Washington Post and Britain’s Guardian newspaper. Everyone who follows WL already knew about this hash thing in 2011, it was brought up in detail during the Manning trial. The DOJ was well aware of the possibility of indicting Assange over this, but opted to not do so until recently. >If parent poster wants to make a case for universal expiration, that any crime should cease to be prosecutable if it goes cold or suspects can stay away for long enough This has nothing at all to do with what I'm saying. I'm saying that DOJ flipflopping on this indicates that this was a politically motivated decision.

franey 8y ago
You're conflating two different things: publishing classified material, which the DOJ under Obama didn't charge, and a CFAA violation. Assange is getting charged for a CFAA violation. "Hacking" isn't a great description of what the law forbids. It forbids obtaining information by "intentionally access[ing] a computer without authorization or exceed[ing] authorized access". https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1030 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1030
- ryanlol 8y ago
  >You're conflating two different things: publishing classified material, which the DOJ under Obama didn't charge, and a CFAA violation. I am not. This CFAA violation has been publicly discussed for 8 years now, I know exactly what I mean. The idea of indicting Assange for publishing classified material has always been a weird conspiracy theory.
xoa 8y ago
>Why did they not indict him before 2018? Could be they just saw no reason to bother because there was no possibility of getting him. There is no requirement to indict someone immediately upon collecting evidence, indictment is merely the formal accusation of a felony issued by a grand jury. I don't understand why some of you seem to consider this some wild thing. Furthermore, even if they had all this evidence nobody may have sat down and come up with a legal theory sufficiently tailored, and in fact you yourself raise this in the rest of your post: >Obama DOJ had decided to not indict Assange for this, this is a politically motivated prosecution by the Trump administration. Your source does not support this leap. In fact quite the contrary: >Justice officials said they looked hard at Assange but realized that they have what they described as a “New York Times problem.” If the Justice Department indicted Assange, it would also have to prosecute the New York Times and other news organizations and writers who published classified material, including The Washington Post and Britain’s Guardian newspaper. Your quote doesn't even make sense exactly because prosecutors never "have to prosecute" anything. But that aside, what we see now is that they haven't indicted him for "publishing classified material" or anything like that, they've found a genuine potential crime (if proven) that is about direct material aid provided by Assange alone. Going after publishing would invite all sorts of 1A arguments and would probably fail unless the papers were directly involved. But unless the NYT and others were in direct contact with Manning and trying to help her break through government security themselves, this charge doesn't in any way involve them. I mean, you do see how your own accusations here are symmetric right? Someone could just as well argue that it was Obama making a politically motivated decision not to indict, though I think that'd be a silly argument too. Ask "if at some point in the last 7 years Assange had suddenly voluntarily left and returned directly to the USA and announced he was willing to face whatever they would bring, would the US have then prosecuted or not?"