[znfi]

There is an article from a Swedish tabloid which could be of interest [1], unfortunately only available in Swedish AFAIK. The reason this article is of interest is mainly that it shows that the Swedish prosecutors seem to be extremely reluctant to issue arrest warrants for people in other EU countries.

In summary, and I hope I do not misrepresent the article too much, a man from Sweden went on a one-day cruise to the Åland Islands. After being out partying on the ship he goes back to his cabin. On his way there he meets two musicians (temporarily) employed by the cruise company and somehow get into a fight with them. (The article is very sparse on details on how the fight started, for the record.)

Note that the fight takes place in front of a CCTV camera, and supposedly one can see on the surveillance photos one of the musicians taking charge and stomping the victim five times in the head, with full force. After briefly leaving, the musicians then returns and kicks him in the face, twice.

The article then discusses the subpar response from the security guards employed by the cruise company.

The musicians are later arrested by the Åland police, their identities checked, but are later released. According to the article they are released because the possible crime was committed in Swedish territory and they are not Finnish citizens [2]. The musicians then return home to Ireland.

However, Swedish police or prosecutors do not seem interested in investigating this case. When pressed on why the prosecutor does not issue an arrest warrant for the men, their identities and whereabouts are supposedly known, he responds by saying that the Swedish prosecutor authority cannot go chasing people all across Europe and they only issue arrest warrants for very serious crimes, like murder.

To summarize the timeline. These events took place in October 2009, if I understand correctly. The Assange case started in August 2010. The news paper article was published in late October 2010.

So, according to this tabloid story, this is an open and shut case for a fairly serious crime, and still the prosecutor authority cannot even be arsed to issue an arrest warrant. At the same time they keep Assange locked in an embassy far longer than he could even be sentenced to for the crime he is accused of commiting. And the Assange case certainly seems much more flimsy, I'm not even sure what he is accused of, exactly. But it certainly seems to boil down to some he-said, she-said situation that will be completely impossible to get to the bottom of.

IIRC he can at most be sentenced to 4 years in prison for the sex crimes he is accused of in Sweden. But in practice he will be released after serving two thirds of this sentence, so he would spend at most 2.6 years in prison. Note also that it seems to me EXTREMLY unlikely that he would recieve a sentence of 4 years, at the very most 2 years but 1 year seems more probable. So if he just left the embassy, went to Sweden and lost the case, then he would most likely be a free man after just 8 months. So his actions certainly seem to indicate that he fears something more than just being found guilty of "less-severe rape". (Sounds a bit weird but is the crime he is accused of IIUC.)

Just to reiterate, he has spent close to 7 years in the embassy for a crime which he would quite likely serve 8 months in prison for.

With the caveat that I am now a lawyer, and whatnot. Quite possibly I've screwed something up in this last part of the analysis.

Edit: To further clarify the point, I guess it is that there is maybe not anything wrong with how he is being treated if one looks at this case in isolation. But when one combines this with how other cases seem to be handled, as well as considering proportionality, things are less clear.

[1]: https://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/a/ka8ndv/har-sparkar-han-...

[2]: The Åland islands belong to Finland.

[dragonwriter]

> At the same time they keep Assange locked in an embassy

Assange wasn't locked in the embassy. He was free (and encouraged by the British, and until they gave up the Swedish) to leave at any time.

Assange chose to stay in the embassy for longer than his likely worst-case sentence, until expelled, in a futile attempt to avoid potential US charges he wasn't then facing and which his decision to delay proceedings so long made actually enabled to come through while he was still in custody following the expiration of Ecuadorian hospitality.

[znfi]

Firstly, I was replying to a post which asked for in which concrete ways Assange was being treated differently from other people in similar situations. I have a bit of a hard time understanding why this phrasing of mine which is not terribly important need to be debated, but OK.

I have in all honestly not followed the Assange case that closely. But my understanding of the situation was that he went to the embassy because he feared he would be extradited to the US and face possible human rights violations if that were the case. Maybe he is de jure "free" to leave the embassy, but it is not as clear that he is de facto free to leave.

Simple example, suppose we just get rid of all the governments etc, and everyone is just "free" to do whatever they want. So in this fantastic world, maybe you are "free" to do whatever you want, but if you do certain things then some big bad guy comes and turns you into minced meat. Are you then "free" to do whatever you want, maybe this can be argued, I am not an expert in philosophy. But if you find it shocking that some (most?) people do not consider this to make you free to do these things, then I'm not sure what to say.

Secondly, you do not allow people to make different interpretations of the situation. You claim that this was a "futile attempt to avoid potential US charges he wasn't then facing", and sure, if you can prove this beyond reasonable doubt then of course there is nothing to discuss here. However, I see no such proof, not even an attempt at such a thing.

More concretely, are you going to tell me with a straight face that if you were in the position of Assange you would without batting an eye just go to Sweden and risk being extradited to the US? Like the US runs Guantanamo, bombs countries left right and center without UN approval, Snowden who exposed government lies and breaking of laws lives in exile, etc. Please note, my point here isn't that the US is terrible or anything, but just that Assange can have a justified fear of being treated poorly there given the circumstances.

So the question isn't really "which way is it", will Assange face human rights violations if he is extradited to the US? Rather the question seems to me to be something like, is it "completly insane" for Assange to think that he might face these violations.

[gamblor956]

At the same time they keep Assange locked in an embassy far longer than he could even be sentenced to for the crime he is accused of commiting.

It was Assange's choice to go the embassy, to request asylum, and to remain there for 7 years. Nobody made him do that.

And the Assange case certainly seems much more flimsy, I'm not even sure what he is accused of, exactly. But it certainly seems to boil down to some he-said, she-said situation that will be completely impossible to get to the bottom of.

Possibly. Assange fled to the embassy when he was informed he would be extradited to Sweden to face an investigation. One of the weird things about Swedish law is that back then it might not have allowed criminal investigations in absentia.

So his actions certainly seem to indicate that he fears something more than just being found guilty of "less-severe rape". (Sounds a bit weird but is the crime he is accused of IIUC.)

This answer is actually known. If he had been found guilty of rape in Sweden, he would have been deported back to Australia (since he is an Australian citizen). And Australia has no restrictions on extradition to the US, such as the exception for capital charges commonly found in the EU.

But when one combines this with how other cases seem to be handled, as well as considering proportionality, things are less clear.

This one is easy. That was actually Swedish policy (and possibly actually Swedish law) back then not to pursue criminal cases against foreigners outside of Sweden, and they applied this same policy to Assange as well. [https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-14/julian-assange-to-be-...] But then the prosecutor got absolutely railed in Sweden for letting an accused rapist escape justice simply because he fled the jurisdiction. Unlike the Aland Islands case, in which the suspects were arrested but permitted by authorities to return home, Assange simply left...and that makes all the difference. It's one thing for someone to escape justice because authorities fucked up. But it's another thing to let someone escape justice simply because they decided to opt out of the process.

[znfi]

As explained in the answer to a sibling post, the question of if he is "locked" in the embassy or not seems mostly a philosophical one. Just imagine I used a different word if you do not like it.

The point I tired to make when I wrote this was that in some cases the Swedish prosecutor authority felt it was too inconvenient to even file European Arrest Warrants in the first place, and a prosecutor saying that this was only done in stuff like murder cases. Then in another case they are keeping a guy in house arrest for 7 years. I made this comment in reply to a request for how Assange was being treated differently compared to other people.

The second point about criminal investigations in absentia mostly seems like a "fun fact", and I dont really see anything I can reply to. Sorry if I'm missing something here.

Regarding the third point, yes, that was my whole point that Assange has shown that he seems to have genuine fear of being the victim of some form of human rights violations should he be extradited to the US. Since if he had no such fears, he could go to Sweden, and even if he loses the case he would be out walking in maybe as little as 8 months. Now he has spent 7 years in an embassy. It seems to me clear that he has demonstrated that he is not hiding in the embassy because he is afraid of the rape allegations in Sweden. If his fears are justified or not, I am not in a position to give any kind of serious answer to.

I am unable to find any support in the linked article that Sweden did not pursue criminal cases against foreigners outside of Sweden. But if you have any such evidence, and that there was a policy change with regards to Assange, then this is highly relevant in that it shows that Assange is not treated the same as others. In the tabloid article I linked the prosecutor seem to claim that for example in murder cases an international arrest warrant would be issued.

I'm not sure in what sense the prosecutor was railed for letting Assange go. And if so, which prosecutory? In fact, the Åland island case and Assange seem rather similar. Assange too was permitted to leave Sweden, according to the article you linked [1]

[1]: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-14/julian-assange-to-be-... Section "What happened next?", relevant paragraph "By the time a Swedish court ruled that Mr Assange should be detained for questioning, he had flown back to London (after being granted permission to do so by Swedish authorities). "

[gamblor956]

The points I tried to make are (a) Assange has only himself to blame for being stuck there for 7 years and then getting kicked out, and (b) that Sweden had a formal policy, and possibly even a law about not prosecuting non-Swedish individuals who were not physical in Swedish territory.

That article pretty clearly states that the prosecutor believed that Swedish law prevented the investigation from proceeding, and that matches what the prosecutor in the article you cited said to the tabloid.

The policy was changed because of Assange. It's not specially applied to him--the new policy applies to everyone. He's just the only one you here about outside Sweden because he's globally infamous.

[vidarh]

Is there anything about this change? Because I'm certain Sweden has indicted people in absentia long before Assange, though it is rare. E.g. I'm pretty sure they indicted the person later convicted of the assassination of foreign minister Anna Lindh in absentia before he was apprehended, and that was back in 2003.

I'll also note that the prosecutor was contradicted by Swedish legal experts already back when Assange was detained in the UK and Ny first made that claim. It was noteworthy also because Swedish police sent people to interview two suspected murderers elsewhere in Europe while Assange's extradiction case was happening, yet Ny continued to claim it was impossible for her to do so with Assange.

I think Assange was being paranoid, but I also think Ny was letting her own preferences take precedence over pursuing the case as best possible, for whatever her reasons might be (I've in the past suggested that rather than US involvement it's more likely she "just" wanted to make an example of him, but that's pure speculation)

EDIT: Here's a brief news item claiming the above assassin was indicted in absentia: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2003-09-17/man-detained-over-kil...

Here is a more substantial one: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/swedish-police-issue-arrest-...

[znfi]

I'm not sure why you do not just provide a citation for this claim that Swedish law prevented the investigation from proceeding. The claim which seems to be the closest to this seems to be "In 2010, the prosecutor in charge of the case, Marianne Ny, said Swedish law prevented her from questioning anyone by video link or in the London embassy.". However, the very next sentence in the article goes on to say that "She later admitted it was legally possible, but refused to budge, saying that questioning him in the embassy 'would lower the quality of the interview'."

With regards to the policy change, to some extent I dont care if they apply it consistently to other people now as well. Just that they changed the policy when they were chasing a guy who had pissed of and embarrassed the most powerful nation in the world seems very, well, convenient.

Perhaps more importantly, I'm not sure I am convinced that there has been such a massive policy shift as such. I would like to hear more about these other people that are being chased all around Europe by the Swedish prosecutor authority, but we don't hear about because they are not globally infamous.

I should perhaps add that just because Assange is (possibly) treated differently, this does not prove that there is some conspiracy against him or whatever. This case has gathered a lot of media attention and whatnot. In many ways a conspiracy seems unlikely, or at least unnecessary. Many of the actors involved seems to just follow the path of least resistance and/or acting in their own interest. Sweden does not have much to lose by doing this, certainly relations between US and Sweden are not damaged by this. Marianne Ny seems like a somewhat crazy feminist who IIRC has made statements that the methods she has developed for investigating crimes against women has "good effect on the perpetrator even in those cases where he is not found guilty by a court of law".