Yes, and it looks like the article is the same type of thing. The author in the first section presumes that the only available historical accounts are all wrong

Yes, and it looks like the article is the same type of thing. The author in the first section presumes that the only available historical accounts are all wrong, and that the early Christians needed to find a reason why Pilate didn’t suffer horribly so they redacted the record to absolve him. But supposing the only available historical accounts are loosely accurate, there was no need to absolve him, even assuming the premise that anyone who did bad stuff to Jesus theologically and psychologically had to meet a Bad End. …but uh, there’s also no record of what happened to Caiaphas in the gospels. Presumably he didn’t meet a grisly fate either, and he’s certainly blamed by the gospels much more than Pilate. You can do anything reasoning backwards from the desired conclusions, and that’s what a lot of historiography is.