U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema has finally rendered her verdict on whether to unseal the "secret" charges against Julian Assange. On Wednesday, she has decided to rule in favor of the U.S. prosecutors who argued to keep the charges sealed, because there is no evidence the charges exist:
"Until there is a sufficiently certain disclosure that charges have in fact been filed, the Committee's common law and First Amendment claims are premature."
newsonline/flickr, CC BY 2.0
In November 2018, a lawsuit as filed by the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press who wanted access to "any criminal complaint, indictment or other charging documents" against the WikiLeaks founder. Prosecutor Gordon Kromber argued against this, saying:
"Any contrary rule would completely undermine the proper functioning of the criminal process at this stage: anyone could petition the Court to require the government to confirm whether the time was right to flee or evade arrest."
"In either event, the government is not required to publicly acknowledge which of those two possibilities happens to be the case with respect to any individual. The First Amendment does not require the government to confirm or deny the existence of criminal charges in this case."
Earlier in November, the existence of the charges were revealed. The U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia (EDVA) fumbled an attempt to seal someone else's charges by using documents to request a seal on Assange's charges as a template in another case. Assanges name was left by accident, tipping their hands that Assange has already been charged but those charges are currently sealed.
The complaint, supporting affidavit, and arrest warrant, as well as this motion and the proposed order, would need to remain sealed until Assange is arrested in connection with the charges in the criminal complaint and can therefore no longer evade or avoid arrest and extradition in this matter.
Source
Even leaked Stratfor emails show how some in the intelligence arena knew of Assange's charges in 2012:
Source
But in response, the government is only saying they admit to making "an unintentional error":
"The only thing you can conclude from our mistake is that we made a mistake, and anything else is speculation."
Source
Previously at the first hearing, Judge Brinkema seemed to side with the Committee in part, agreeing that the sealing of the charges to prevent Assange from evading capture is a moot point as everyone knows where he is:
"Everyone knows where he is, so what’s the rationale for keeping it under seal?"
It took her 2 months to finally decide that there is no right for anyone to see the charges, as no "real" proof has been offered by the Committee that the charges exist, even though they do. The government only has to play the denial game and avoid admitting anything. Brinkema is playing along with this absurdity, writing:
"The Committee's evidentiary amalgam of an obviously erroneous filing in an unrelated case, public speculation, news stories, and anonymous statements by government officials does not supply a level of certainty comparable to that afforded by official acknowledgement."
The "official acknowledgement" of merely saying they made an error weights more heavily than all other evidence that indicates the charges exist. All the government needs to say is that they made an error, but what kind of error did they really make?
Are we to believe they simply put the wrongs name by accident? What would merit such a fumble? It seems the actual error was using a case against Assange as a template for another case, and forgetting to remove his name, due to sloppy copy/paste work by the U.S. prosecutors in Virgina.
Regardless, the no-longer-secret charges will remain sealed until Assange is arrested. At which point, the charges will be known to exist "officially", of which will have already known they existed all along. WikiLeaks says the ruling allows the government to stay silent and *"build political cover for Assange's arrest without giving the public, the press and Mr Assange the facts necessary to resist it." I agree. How can you effectively resist and gain support to prevent what the government claims doesn't even exist?
References:
- Wikileaks says founder Julian Assange 'cannot hope to receive fair trial' after a judge refuses to unseal potential charges against him in the US
- Australian diplomats visit Assange, told of 'deteriorating health'
- A Judge Won't Force The US Government To Reveal If Julian Assange Has Been Charged With A Crime
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What this leaves me wondering now, is does a person with pending charges, sealed or not from the public, have a right to disclosure on these charges? If Assange was to have an attorney inquire on his behalf, would they legally have to disclose to him the charges?
The only way I can see that they do not have a sealed indictment is if this is a psych game they are running on him to make him sweat over something that isn't real. Hoping to wear him down as he continues to sit in his prison aka embassy. The people he has pissed off are not known for their compassion.
Nope, the legal system is set to keep sealed charges hidden until an arrest is made.
Bummer deal. Sets a bad precedent. I hope they appeal.
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