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.
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.