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Wikileaks Co-founder Julian Assange Arrested in London (theguardian.com)
Wikileaks co-founder Julian Assange has been arrested at the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where the WikiLeaks founder was granted refuge in 2012 while on bail in the UK over sexual assault allegations against him in Sweden. From a report: At the time, Assange claimed that if he was extradited to Sweden he might be arrested by the US and face charges relating to WikiLeaks's publication of hundreds of thousands of US diplomatic cables. The journalist and Assange supporter John Pilger called last week for people to "fill the street outside the embassy and protect him and show solidarity with a courageous man." US authorities have never officially confirmed that they have charged Assange, but in November 2018 a mistake in a document filed in an unrelated case hinted that criminal charges might have been prepared in secret. London's Metropolitan police released a statement which said officers had executed a warrant after the Ecuadorian government withdrew asylum.
Funnily enough, the US has placed an extradition request, as confirmed now by the UK metropolitan police. So I'm afraid you are wrong.
From The Guardian:
Extradition request from US confirmed
Scotland Yard has confirmed that Assange was arrested on behalf of the US after receiving a request for his extradition.
In a statement it said:
Julian Assange, 47, (03.07.71) has today, Thursday 11 April, been further arrested on behalf of the United States authorities, at 10:53hrs after his arrival at a central London police station. This is an extradition warrant under Section 73 of the Extradition Act. He will appear in custody at Westminster Magistrates’ Court as soon as possible.
"Science will win because it works." - Stephen Hawking
Apparently, the US does think they have something they can extradite him for, because he's now been arrested under the extradition act on behalf of US authorities. The Swedes seem to be planning on re-opening their assualt charges as well, so there's a potential he'll be making a detour to Scandinavia before crossing the Atlantic, which might not be all that unlikely if the objective is about keeping him bottled up as long as possible. Given he's now a proven flight risk I suspect his chances of bail while all this drags on through the appeals courts (which has taken years in other high profile cases) are pretty slim, so even if he ultimately prevails and avoids extradition it's likely to be quite some time before he's getting out of custody.
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
That's not how UK courts work.
For a start the maximum sentence is 12 months. To get that the prosecution would have to show that he was acting purely maliciously, without any good reason at all. Since he now has irrefutable evidence that cases are pending against him in the US, and that the US does treat people accused/convicted of similar crimes by standards that would be illegal in the UK (e.g. Chelsea Manning), it's unlikely that they would be able to get the maximum sentence.
That evidence would also add weight to the argument that he was effectively incarcerated for 7 years, being unable to leave for at least part of it while Sweden was still seeking extradition.
So if convicted he would probably get 6 months maximum, of which he would likely serve half with good behaviour, and from which time already served awaiting trial would be deducted. Given that he would likely spend more than 3 months locked up simply awaiting trial, in practice he would walk free immediately.
So the CPS has to ask if it is worth all the expense of a prosecution, or find additional stuff to charge him with.
Of course they could decide to prosecute anyway, because he upset a lot of people and cost the government many millions of Pounds, but it would likely descend into farce with Assange coming off better in the end.
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SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
He was holed up in that embassy a good 4 years before the Hillary stuff.
"Julian Assange, 47, (03.07.71) has today, Thursday 11 April, been further arrested on behalf of the United States authorities, at 10:53hrs after his arrival at a central London police station. This is an extradition warrant under Section 73 of the Extradition Act. He will appear in custody at Westminster Magistrates' Court later today (Thursday, 11 April)."
The US has never asked anyone to arrest him with the intention of extraditing him.
Sadly the facts have now overtaken your careful and well-reasoned argument. The US has requested his extradition on computer hacking charges for helping Manning.
"As to Assange, he cannot be held criminally liable for any of the classified data leaked to Wikileaks and published by him on the site."
You must be kidding.
He's not kidding. And it's true.
If you never got a security clearance, then you never signed away your first amendment rights. Which means you can publish any classified information that lands in your lap.
The key is the information must "land in your lap". If you become an active participant in the leak (direct what to leak, offer a reward, provide technical help, etc), then you've crossed the line into being a co-conspirator.