It doesn’t assume that at all. Explaining the known facts relating to legal controversies sounds like reasonable journalism to me. Labelling somebody a crook is

It doesn’t assume that at all. Explaining the known facts relating to legal controversies sounds like reasonable journalism to me. Labelling somebody a crook is a conclusion that the reader may choose to draw from those facts, not one that should be prescribed to them. Have you ever broken the law? You almost certainly have. Does that make you a crook?