Wow. Just.......wow.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Hattip on this from nebris .

So....remember that story about the guy who founded Wikileaks who was brought up on a false rape charge?

Here's some follow-up on it:

This weekend, the controversies surrounding WikiLeaks took another strange turn. Late on Friday, the Swedish newspaper Expressen disclosed that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was the subject of an arrest warrant arising out of charges by two female witnesses that he had raped them within a three-day period. The late-hours special duty prosecutor, Maria Häljebo Kjellstrand, issued an arrest warrant for Assange, who quickly protested his innocence and charged that the claims against him were a “dirty trick.” Within twenty-four hours, Swedish prosecutors did a near complete about-face. After finishing a preliminary examination of the claims, chief prosecutor Eva Finné, to whom the case was handed off, concluded that the evidence did not justify an arrest warrant, and canceled the one issued by Ms. Kjellstrand. “I do not believe there is any reason to suspect that he has committed rape,” Ms. Finné told London’s Daily Telegraph. She noted that the file would remain open under a downgraded charge of sexuellt ofredande, or unwanted sexual contact, a far less serious offense. One of the women behind the charges gave an interview to the Swedish paper Aftonbladet on Sunday, backpedaling furiously. She stated that she was surprised to learn that the accusations were treated as a rape charge and denied that there had been any encounter with Assange involving violence or force. She suggested that the controversy had to do with Assange’s failure to use a condom during intercourse. In the meantime, Sweden’s Justice Ombudsman was demanding a formal investigation into how the accusations came to be sensationalized by the press on the basis of an improperly issued arrest warrant.

From my POV in a liberal democracy that's really waging a war for freedom to bring democracy to an area there should be no need for secrecy. This kind of dirty trickery belongs in a society like the old USSR where the truth being published about even the most noble things was up for question. From my POV I also see nothing worthy of praise in the reaction of the US Government to this. Even assuming no overt influence, if as the rest of the article in the link notes the government very much did push this along then it's fair to note that such behavior is shameful from any US government.

This is also why I feel the USA set itself up for a hard crash once it made rhetoric of Westernizing countries as the end goals of its wars. Your thoughts?

Rest of the article linked here: http://harpers.org/archive/2010/08/hbc-90007522

Comments

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

White hat versus the world. Yadda-yadda.

[merig00.livejournal.com]

Or the late-hours special duty prosecutor wanted to advance her career with a big name case?

[sgiffy.livejournal.com]

Thats kind of what I am thinking. I would hope that if the CIA or other shadowy group were behind it they would have done a better fucking job.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

The shadowy groups are just as incompetent as everyone else is.

[http://users.livejournal.com/aviation_/]

Your personal response seems to be your opinion on Wikileaks in general. You've completely avoided the unpleasant issue of the rape charges aka no condom charge.

Somebody put forward the word rape. Then suddenly somebody says, "Oh, no, this is not a violent person. I am not afraid of this person." ????? Ok, rape is a physical, violent act. If we're trying to smear Assange's name, let's first use a horrible world so that it gets out there, then pull it back into something sketchy that cannot be proved. Is it sketchy for someone to refuse to wear a condom? Meh. Kinda, but not really as long as they're still generally respectful if you change your mind. Then you just kind of, you know, don't have sex with them.
I really, really, really hate feeling like there is even a 1% chance that I am victim-blaming. But nobody is saying specifically what supposedly happened.

I'm very suspicious of the CIA. I am also suspicious of random individual who wants revenge (http://current.com/news/92625813_legal-revenge-blog-by-the-supposed-victim-of-julian-assange-from-wikileaks.htm) or who have a huge political problem with Assange and might be willing to do anything to stop it. In the case that I am wrong, I feel pretty shitty about it. It is just all so bizarre with the going-ons with Wikileaks right now.

[http://users.livejournal.com/aviation_/]

also wtf it is not a crime to not use a condom unless there is force involved (in which case the condom isn't relevant, anyway), which would mean either she is lying about the first part or the second.

[qnetter]

It is if you slip it off or coerce the other party to go without it.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Trust me, if I got started on that it would have turned into multiple paragraphs of incoherent rage about this whole thing as rape is the kind of crime where it being treated this lightly is not wise on anyone's part. But then this is the USA where a pedophile rapist did not commit rape-rape, so who the Hell knows?

[http://users.livejournal.com/aviation_/]

Are you saying that I am treating it lightly or that the media is?

[devil-ad-vocate.livejournal.com]

"However, there is as yet no direct evidence for the claim that the accusations leveled at Assange were the work of some intelligence service, and even if there were, Assange has plenty of governments anxious to shut him down aside from the United States."

If Assange is such a heroic figure - righteously bringing dark secrets into the light of truth - why did he accuse the United States of originating this charge when he had no evidence? Hardly what one would expect from a courageous truth-seeker.

[http://users.livejournal.com/aviation_/]

Because he is a flawed human being like everybody else.

[thies.livejournal.com]

righteously bringing dark secrets into the light of truth

I still haven't seen anything from those documents that was unknown to the citizens of countries (well, mostly just the US really) who have troops committed to Afghanistan and which would result in these citizens to demand a policy change. The whole thing is somewhat lacking in its actual whistle blowing aspect.
I only see whistle blowing when presuming that the release was intended to benefit the Taliban and affiliated groups, there was certainly enough previously unknown to them information in the documents which could affect their policies.

[http://users.livejournal.com/aviation_/]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/wikileaks-reveals-afghan-civilian-deaths-2035681.html

[thies.livejournal.com]

With the original charges remaining I wonder when Assange was beatified after seeing all the apologists. I guess Assange is happy about another opportunity to be a martyr though. Unless someone comes forward with credible evidence for a conspiracy I'll consider this nothing more than a media circus.

[http://users.livejournal.com/aviation_/]

Saying "hey, something is fishy here" does not equate with being an apologist.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

No version of the US government is capable of pulling a conspiracy like that off, especially in the Internet age. What I do think is that the timing is curious. I doubt it's a conspiracy, because if the US government was *that* good they'd just pull a leaf from Putin's book and put Sodium Morphate in his pie or something.

[sealwhiskers.livejournal.com]

Are you upset because an investigation about rape and sexual assault is closed to the media? Or how two evening rags handled this matter? (Expressen and Aftonbladet are the nr 1 Swedish evening rags, comparable to Britain's "The Sun" or some such). The Swedish news media handled the matter more soberly, btw.

I just want to say that I think the prosecution is doing the right thing in investigating leaks and surrounding circumstances, they reacted as they should have on rape charges and reviewed evidence etc. And yes, these things are closed to the public - as they are by law in the US also, because of many factors, the primary one being to protect the presumed victims.

If you study Swedish records laws and state bureaucracy you will find though, that it is known all over the world for its enormous openness. Government is in general fantastically transparent compared to many other countries, among those the US. As a citizen you have the right to demand to view most forms of documentation, even during a process. Sexual crimes, crimes against children and adoption cases are exempt and have special laws however.

[luvdovz.livejournal.com]

You beat me to it but thank you.

[http://users.livejournal.com/aviation_/]

Sweden scores as high as possible on the Press Freedom Index and just about as high as possible on Corruption Perceptions Index. Even though corruption can still be covered up and these little indexes are just numbers, I'd rather be in Sweden than just about anywhere else if I have to deal with the legal system.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

My irritation is that the timing is a problem. The US government makes a massive furor over documents on this site and it just so happens the founder is brought up on charges of rape that have been retracted? Uh. huh. Even if it turns out that this really *did* happen the timing would be an epic example of Murphy's Law for the Swedes at any rate.

[the-rukh.livejournal.com]

I think there's still a lot more to this story than we've heard.

[404.livejournal.com]

I'm waiting for a WikiLeaks style site just to uncover what WikiLeaks does.

[blorky.livejournal.com]

I guess it wasn't rape rape.

[op-tech-glitch.livejournal.com]

from nebris.

Entire thread goes kaflooey right there.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

At least nobody in this set of threads seems to know who he is. Surprised there hasn't been any wankery of that sort.