[marcus_holmes]

He's an Australian citizen who was in various countries while operating Wikileaks. What crime(s) did he commit?

It's not a crime to break USA secrecy laws (or, in fact, any US laws) while not being a citizen or resident of the USA. With the caveat that the behaviour is not also illegal in whatever country the alleged perpetrator is actually a citizen/resident of.

[foldr]

One of the crime's he's charged with is hacking.

What you are saying underlines my point. It was indeed unlikely that Assange would be extradited merely for leaking classified information, as it is difficult for even a US citizen to be successfully prosecuted for doing that. But he is being charged with other crimes.

[marcus_holmes]

I think you're missing the point of TFA. This is a show trial, not a legitimate extradition of a criminal. The fact that he's been charged with crimes doesn't make him guilty of them, and he, like everyone, deserves a fair hearing in court to determine that.

The original charges against him would have resulted in a failed extradition (as the prosecution admit). So the US government changed the charges during the trial to "better" ones that were more likely to succeed. Without giving the defence any time to prepare a case defending against those new charges.

This isn't justice. I'm ashamed as a UK citizen that we're not able to stand up to the USA and conduct an extradition hearing that is actually just. Especially since the USA refuses to extradite one of its citizens to the UK when charged with murder.

I'm furious as an Australian citizen (I'm dual-national) that we're not fighting to prevent such gross injustice to one of our own citizens. The Aussie government has done nothing, said nothing, about any of it. It's pathetic and infuriating.

[foldr]

It seems to me quite likely that he is guilty of the hacking charges (though I am open minded on this point).

For it to be a show trial there would have to be no realistic possibility of the jury finding him not guilty. I don't see why that should be the case.

[marcus_holmes]

well, for a start there's no jury. A magistrate, who is already clearly showing bias and a tendency to read verdicts from a laptop rather than actually decide them, is the sole arbiter of whether he gets extradited or not.

[foldr]

I am talking about the trial following his (probable) extradition. If you'll forgive a little semantic pedantry, an extradition hearing is neither a trial nor (in the UK) a proceeding that's televized, so it would be quite a stretch to describe an extradition hearing as a 'show trial'.

[vidarh]

Why should we trust he will get a fair hearing at the actual trial if he's not even getting a fair hearing at the extradition hearing?

[marcus_holmes]

no, you don't understand. This is the trial. If he gets to the USA he'll "commit suicide" in a cell, or have some weird show trial where he confesses to everything. There's zero chance that the USA will actually conduct a fair trial, and set him free if he's found to do have done nothing except embarrass powerful people. This is his last chance. The British justice system was supposed to be incorruptible, and blind. Not so much now.

[btilly]

He is charged with hacking for receiving a hashed password and failing to successfully crack it.

There is absolutely no way that this would be pursued if it were not for his running Wikileaks. This is a clear case of using selective enforcement to enforce a rule that could not be created on a law. (Given the first amendment, what he did that we really don't like is very squarely protected by the Constitution.)

[marcus_holmes]

But he's not a USA citizen, and wasn't in the USA when the activity occurred. What the First Amendment to the Constitution of the USA has to say about it is completely irrelevant.

[mindslight]

> What the First Amendment to the Constitution of the USA has to say about it is completely irrelevant.

First, if Assange did not violate the law of the US, then there is no cause for extradition. And so it does make sense to be talking about the US legality at this point, since USG going against its very own charter indicates that he will not receive a fair trial.

More generally, the United States Bill of Rights is framed as listing natural rights that everyone has. Yes, NSA is violating your US fourth amendment rights, despite you not being a US citizen. YMMV with practical enforcement though.

[chrisco255]

In legal practice this is not true at all. The recognition of natural rights and legal enforcement of them are two different things. The Constitution begins with the phrase "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence,[note 1] promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." It clearly states that the Constitution is for the people of the U.S.

The Declaration of Independence went further, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with inherent and inalienable rights; that among these, are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness"

However, no legal guarantees of rights are made in the declaration.

[monocasa]

There's plenty of both comments by the founding fathers and subsequent Supreme Court case law that the constitution applies to non citizens as well pretty much anywhere it says "people" rather than "citizen". This comes from a combo of the rights at the time being more thought of as a listing of inalienable rights rather than rights granted by the government, as well as the idea that in order to hold non citizens to the obligations of the legal system you should grant the the rights of the legal system as well.

https://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?a...

[mindslight]

I acknowledged the mechanical legal aspect - "YMMV with practical enforcement though."

But we should hold our governments to the standards they are purportedly founded on, rather than buying into the justifications that they themselves have created. The opportunities to concretely do this are rare, but extradition trials being judged by a different government are one of those places.

[raxxorrax]

That it doesn't mean shit seems to be indeed "legal" practice.

[behringer]

The 1st amendment and the constitution applies to all persons. Not just citizens.

[btilly]

According to the courts, the Constitution does not apply at borders. See https://www.aclu.org/other/constitution-100-mile-border-zone for more.

Most US spying programs violate the 4th amendment. And have been ruled Constitutional as long as the targets are not US citizens. And if you want to seize someone's assets, you just sue the assets. The owner has been ruled to not have standing to object. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asset_forfeiture for more.

Despite our law enforcement and government swearing to uphold the Constitution, it seems to be more useful as toilet paper sometimes.

[marcus_holmes]

No. The USA's constitution does not apply to people outside the USA. I don't know what kind of ideological bubble you need to live in to think that your country's laws are applicable to the entire planet, but I assure you they're not.

[chrisco255]

In theory, yes. In legal practice, however, no...no it doesn't.

[foldr]

All laws are selectively enforced. I think the more interesting question is whether he's guilty. I don't know. But if he did it, it's pretty clearly illegal, and it's reasonable to charge him.

Note that it's completely irrelevant that he failed to crack the password. Failure to successfully carry out a crime to completion just means that you're incompetent, not that you're innocent.

[btilly]

The only evidence we have that he is guilty is what is claimed to be an intercepted IM.

Were I on a jury, I would refuse to convict because I would consider there to be a reasonable doubt that the IM was real and not invented by the government to make their case.

[foldr]

Oh, do you have a friend on the prosecution team who’s presented the entire prosecution case to you before the trial?

Or do you mean that that’s the only evidence that’s publicly known at the moment?

[btilly]

That's the only evidence that's publicly known at the moment. And, given the extraordinary lengths that the USA has gone to to persecute Assange, it would take a high bar before I'd believe the government at this point.

What Assange is actually guilty of is running Wikileaks with the explicit purpose of making it hard for interest groups within the government to conduct "business as usual" against the interests of both the world and the American public.

On the positive side, Wikileaks helped convince the USA to get out of Iraq, and helped cause the Arab Spring uprisings that removed several dictatorships. On the downside, Wikileaks has become a pawn used by foreign espionage groups attempting to manipulate the US public. See the DNC email dumps which appear to be the work of Russian hackers attempting to manipulate the US election.

Go ahead and charge him with what he actually did, and convince the world that on the balance it does more harm than good. But don't manipulate governments around the world to pursue him by dishonest means.