Something Rotten in the State of Sweden: 8 Big Problems with the ‘Case’ Against Assange
February 22, 2013
By NAOMI WOLF
Source: News from Underground
Now that Andrew Kreig, of the Justice Integrity Project, has confirmed
Karl Rove’s role as an advisor to the Swedish government in its
prosecution of Julian Assange on sexual misconduct charges, it is
important that we note the many glaring aberrations in the handling of
Assange’s case by the authorities in Sweden.
Dr. Brian Palmer, a social anthropologist at Uppsala University,
explained on Kreig’s radio show last month that Karl Rove has been
working directly as an advisor to the governing Moderate Party. Kreig
also reported, in Connecticut Watchdog, that the Assange accusers’
lawyer is a partner in the law firm Borgström and Bodström, whose
other name partner, Thomas Bodström, is a former Swedish Minister of
Justice. In that office, Bodström helped approve a 2001 CIA rendition
request to Sweden, to allow the CIA to fly two asylum-seekers from
Sweden to Egypt, where they were tortured. This background compels us
to review the case against Assange with extreme care.
Based on my 23 years of reporting on global rape law, and my five
years of supporting women at rape crisis centers and battered women’s
shelters, I can say with certainty that this case is not being treated
as a normal rape or sexual assault case. New details from the Swedish
police make this quite clear. Their transcript of the complaints
against Assange is strikingly unlike the dozens of such transcripts
that I have read throughout the years as an advocate for victims of
sex crimes.
Specifically, there are eight ways in which this transcript is
unusual:
1) Police never pursue complaints in which there is no indication of
lack of consent.
Ask Sweden to produce ANY other police report in which any action was
taken in a situation in which there is no stated lack of consent or
threat of force. Police simply won’t act on a complaint if there is no
indication of a lack of consent, or of consent in the face of
violence. The Assange transcripts, in contrast to any typical sex
crime report, are a set of transcripts in which neither of the women
has indicated a lack of consent. (There is one point at which Miss W
asserts she was asleep – in which case it would indeed have been
illegal to have sex with her – but her deleted tweets show that she
was not asleep, and subsequent discussion indicates consent.)
The Assange transcript is therefore anomalous, as it does not suggest
in any way that either woman was unconsenting, or felt threatened. On
this basis alone, therefore, the Assange transcript is completely
aberrant.
2) Police do not let two women report an accusation about one man
together.
The transcripts seem to indicate that the police processed the two
accusers’ complaints together.
This is completely unheard-of in sex crime procedures; and the burden
should be on Clare Mongomery, QC, or Marianne Ny, to produce a single
other example of this being permitted.
Never will two victims be allowed by police to come in and tell their
stories together–even, or especially, if the stories are about one
man.
Indeed, this is a great frustration to those who advocate for rape
victims. You can have seven alleged victims all accusing the same guy
— and none will be permitted to tell their stories together.
It doesn’t matter if they coordinated in advance as the Assange
accusers did, or if they are close friends and came in together: the
police simply will not take their complaints together or even in the
same room. No matter how much they may wish to file a report together,
their wishes won’t matter: the women will be separated, given separate
interview times and even locations, and their cases will be processed
completely separately.
The prosecutor, rather than being able to draw on both women’s
testimony, will actually have to struggle to get the judge to allow a
second or additional accusation or evidence from another case.
Usually other such evidence will NOT be allowed. Miss A would have her
case processed and then Miss W — with absolutely no ability for the
prosecutor to draw form one set of testimony to the next.
The reason for this is sound: it is to keep testimony from
contaminating separate trials–a source of great frustration to
prosecutors and rape victim advocates.
Thus the dual testimonies taken in this case are utterly atypical and
against all Western and especially Swedish rape law practice and
policy.
3) Police never take testimony from former boyfriends.
There’s another remarkable aberration in this transcript: the report
of a former boyfriend of “Miss A,” testifying that she’d always used a
condom in their relationship.
Now, as one who has supported many rape victims through the reporting
process, I have to say that the inclusion of this utterly atypical–
and, in fact, illegal–note will make anyone who has counselled rape
victims through the legal process’ feel as though her head might
explode.
There’s a rape shield law in Sweden (as there is throughout Europe)
that prevents anyone not involved in the case to say anything to the
police, whether it be positive or negative, about the prior sexual
habits of the complainant. No matter how much a former or current
boyfriend may want to testify about his girlfriends’ sex practices —
even if that woman wants him to — the courts will, rightly, refused to
hear it, or record it, or otherwise allow it in the record.
4) Prosecutors never let two alleged victims have the same lawyer.
Both women are being advised by the same high-powered, politically
connected lawyer. That would never happen under normal circumstances
because the prosecutor would not permit the risk of losing the case
because of contamination of evidence and the risk of the judge
objecting to possible coaching or shared testimony in the context of a
shared attorney.
So why would the Swedish prosecutor, Marianne Ny, allow such a thing
in this case? Perhaps — bearing in mind the threat that Assange will
be extradited to the US once he is in Sweden — because she does not
expect to have a trial, let alone have to try to win one.
5) A lawyer never typically takes on two alleged rape victims as
clients.
No attorney–and certainly no high-powered attorney– would want to
represent two women claiming to have been victimized by the same man,
for the reasons above: the second woman’s testimony could be weaker
than the other one’s, thus lessening the lawyer’s chances of success.
There also is a danger that the judge may well object to the potential
cross-contamination of the women’s stories.
Again, the only reason why a lawyer would thus weaken his own clients’
cases us that s/he does not expect the case to come to trial.
6) A rape victim never uses a corporate attorney.
Typically, if a woman needs a lawyer in addition to the prosecutor who
is pursuing her case (as in the Swedish system) she will be advised by
rape victim advocates, the prosecutor and the police to use a criminal
attorney — someone who handles rape cases or other kinds of assault,
who is familiar with the judges and the courts in these cases. She
will never hire a high-powered corporate attorney who does not
specialize in these cases or work with the local court that would be
hearing her sex crime case if it ever got to trial. Given that a law
firm such as this one charges about four hundred euros an hour, and a
typical rape case takes eight months to a year to get through the
courts – given that legal advice will cost tens of thousands of euros,
which young women victims usually do not have access to – it is
reasonable to ask: who is paying the legal bills?
7) A rape victim is never encouraged to make any kind of contact with
her assailant and she may never use police to compel her alleged
assailant to take medical tests.
The two women went to police to ask if they could get Assange to take
an HIV test.
Sources close to the investigation confirm that indeed Assange was
asked by police to take an HIV test, which came back negative. This is
utterly unheard of and against standard sex crime policy. The Police
do not act as medical mediators for STD testing, since rapists are
dangerous and vindictive. A victim is NEVER advised to manage, even
with police guidance, any further communication with her assailant
that is not through formal judicial channels. Under ordinary
procedures, the women’s wishes for the alleged assailant to take
medical tests would be discouraged by rape victim advocates and
deterred and disregarded by police.
First, the State normally has no power to compel a man who has not
been convicted, let alone formally charged, to take any medical tests
whatsoever. Secondly, rape victims usually fear STD’s or AIDS
infection, naturally enough, and the normal police and prosecutorial
guidance is for them to take their own battery of tests – you don’t
need the man’s test results to know if you have contracted a disease.
Normal rape kit processing–in Sweden as elsewhere–includes such tests
for the alleged victim as a matter of course, partly to help prevent
any contact between the victim and the assailant outside legal
channels.
8) Police and prosecutors never leak police transcripts during an
active investigation because they face punishment for doing so.
The full transcripts of the women’s complaints have been leaked to the
US media. The only people who have access to those documents are
police, prosecutors and the attorneys. Often, frustratingly, rape
victims themselves cannot get their own full set of records related to
their cases. In normal circumstances, the leaking of those transcripts
would be grounds for an immediate investigation of the police and
prosecutors who had access to them. Any official who leaks such
confidential papers faces serious penalties; lawyers who do so can be
disbarred. And yet no one in this case is being investigated or facing
any consequences. It seems quite likely that the Assange documents
were leaked by the police or prosecutors because they got a signal
from higher-ups that they could do so with impunity.
Indeed, these are all major aberrations–suggesting that somebody at
the top has interfered.
And who is at the very top in Sweden? Players working with Karl Rove,
who was a party to the Swedish government’s collusion in the Bush
regime’s rendition/torture program. As Britain holds its hearings into
Julian Assange’s fate, we must take careful note of that connection.
From: Z Net - The Spirit Of Resistance Lives
URL: http://www.
February 22, 2013
By NAOMI WOLF
Source: News from Underground
Now that Andrew Kreig, of the Justice Integrity Project, has confirmed
Karl Rove’s role as an advisor to the Swedish government in its
prosecution of Julian Assange on sexual misconduct charges, it is
important that we note the many glaring aberrations in the handling of
Assange’s case by the authorities in Sweden.
Dr. Brian Palmer, a social anthropologist at Uppsala University,
explained on Kreig’s radio show last month that Karl Rove has been
working directly as an advisor to the governing Moderate Party. Kreig
also reported, in Connecticut Watchdog, that the Assange accusers’
lawyer is a partner in the law firm Borgström and Bodström, whose
other name partner, Thomas Bodström, is a former Swedish Minister of
Justice. In that office, Bodström helped approve a 2001 CIA rendition
request to Sweden, to allow the CIA to fly two asylum-seekers from
Sweden to Egypt, where they were tortured. This background compels us
to review the case against Assange with extreme care.
Based on my 23 years of reporting on global rape law, and my five
years of supporting women at rape crisis centers and battered women’s
shelters, I can say with certainty that this case is not being treated
as a normal rape or sexual assault case. New details from the Swedish
police make this quite clear. Their transcript of the complaints
against Assange is strikingly unlike the dozens of such transcripts
that I have read throughout the years as an advocate for victims of
sex crimes.
Specifically, there are eight ways in which this transcript is
unusual:
1) Police never pursue complaints in which there is no indication of
lack of consent.
Ask Sweden to produce ANY other police report in which any action was
taken in a situation in which there is no stated lack of consent or
threat of force. Police simply won’t act on a complaint if there is no
indication of a lack of consent, or of consent in the face of
violence. The Assange transcripts, in contrast to any typical sex
crime report, are a set of transcripts in which neither of the women
has indicated a lack of consent. (There is one point at which Miss W
asserts she was asleep – in which case it would indeed have been
illegal to have sex with her – but her deleted tweets show that she
was not asleep, and subsequent discussion indicates consent.)
The Assange transcript is therefore anomalous, as it does not suggest
in any way that either woman was unconsenting, or felt threatened. On
this basis alone, therefore, the Assange transcript is completely
aberrant.
2) Police do not let two women report an accusation about one man
together.
The transcripts seem to indicate that the police processed the two
accusers’ complaints together.
This is completely unheard-of in sex crime procedures; and the burden
should be on Clare Mongomery, QC, or Marianne Ny, to produce a single
other example of this being permitted.
Never will two victims be allowed by police to come in and tell their
stories together–even, or especially, if the stories are about one
man.
Indeed, this is a great frustration to those who advocate for rape
victims. You can have seven alleged victims all accusing the same guy
— and none will be permitted to tell their stories together.
It doesn’t matter if they coordinated in advance as the Assange
accusers did, or if they are close friends and came in together: the
police simply will not take their complaints together or even in the
same room. No matter how much they may wish to file a report together,
their wishes won’t matter: the women will be separated, given separate
interview times and even locations, and their cases will be processed
completely separately.
The prosecutor, rather than being able to draw on both women’s
testimony, will actually have to struggle to get the judge to allow a
second or additional accusation or evidence from another case.
Usually other such evidence will NOT be allowed. Miss A would have her
case processed and then Miss W — with absolutely no ability for the
prosecutor to draw form one set of testimony to the next.
The reason for this is sound: it is to keep testimony from
contaminating separate trials–a source of great frustration to
prosecutors and rape victim advocates.
Thus the dual testimonies taken in this case are utterly atypical and
against all Western and especially Swedish rape law practice and
policy.
3) Police never take testimony from former boyfriends.
There’s another remarkable aberration in this transcript: the report
of a former boyfriend of “Miss A,” testifying that she’d always used a
condom in their relationship.
Now, as one who has supported many rape victims through the reporting
process, I have to say that the inclusion of this utterly atypical–
and, in fact, illegal–note will make anyone who has counselled rape
victims through the legal process’ feel as though her head might
explode.
There’s a rape shield law in Sweden (as there is throughout Europe)
that prevents anyone not involved in the case to say anything to the
police, whether it be positive or negative, about the prior sexual
habits of the complainant. No matter how much a former or current
boyfriend may want to testify about his girlfriends’ sex practices —
even if that woman wants him to — the courts will, rightly, refused to
hear it, or record it, or otherwise allow it in the record.
4) Prosecutors never let two alleged victims have the same lawyer.
Both women are being advised by the same high-powered, politically
connected lawyer. That would never happen under normal circumstances
because the prosecutor would not permit the risk of losing the case
because of contamination of evidence and the risk of the judge
objecting to possible coaching or shared testimony in the context of a
shared attorney.
So why would the Swedish prosecutor, Marianne Ny, allow such a thing
in this case? Perhaps — bearing in mind the threat that Assange will
be extradited to the US once he is in Sweden — because she does not
expect to have a trial, let alone have to try to win one.
5) A lawyer never typically takes on two alleged rape victims as
clients.
No attorney–and certainly no high-powered attorney– would want to
represent two women claiming to have been victimized by the same man,
for the reasons above: the second woman’s testimony could be weaker
than the other one’s, thus lessening the lawyer’s chances of success.
There also is a danger that the judge may well object to the potential
cross-contamination of the women’s stories.
Again, the only reason why a lawyer would thus weaken his own clients’
cases us that s/he does not expect the case to come to trial.
6) A rape victim never uses a corporate attorney.
Typically, if a woman needs a lawyer in addition to the prosecutor who
is pursuing her case (as in the Swedish system) she will be advised by
rape victim advocates, the prosecutor and the police to use a criminal
attorney — someone who handles rape cases or other kinds of assault,
who is familiar with the judges and the courts in these cases. She
will never hire a high-powered corporate attorney who does not
specialize in these cases or work with the local court that would be
hearing her sex crime case if it ever got to trial. Given that a law
firm such as this one charges about four hundred euros an hour, and a
typical rape case takes eight months to a year to get through the
courts – given that legal advice will cost tens of thousands of euros,
which young women victims usually do not have access to – it is
reasonable to ask: who is paying the legal bills?
7) A rape victim is never encouraged to make any kind of contact with
her assailant and she may never use police to compel her alleged
assailant to take medical tests.
The two women went to police to ask if they could get Assange to take
an HIV test.
Sources close to the investigation confirm that indeed Assange was
asked by police to take an HIV test, which came back negative. This is
utterly unheard of and against standard sex crime policy. The Police
do not act as medical mediators for STD testing, since rapists are
dangerous and vindictive. A victim is NEVER advised to manage, even
with police guidance, any further communication with her assailant
that is not through formal judicial channels. Under ordinary
procedures, the women’s wishes for the alleged assailant to take
medical tests would be discouraged by rape victim advocates and
deterred and disregarded by police.
First, the State normally has no power to compel a man who has not
been convicted, let alone formally charged, to take any medical tests
whatsoever. Secondly, rape victims usually fear STD’s or AIDS
infection, naturally enough, and the normal police and prosecutorial
guidance is for them to take their own battery of tests – you don’t
need the man’s test results to know if you have contracted a disease.
Normal rape kit processing–in Sweden as elsewhere–includes such tests
for the alleged victim as a matter of course, partly to help prevent
any contact between the victim and the assailant outside legal
channels.
8) Police and prosecutors never leak police transcripts during an
active investigation because they face punishment for doing so.
The full transcripts of the women’s complaints have been leaked to the
US media. The only people who have access to those documents are
police, prosecutors and the attorneys. Often, frustratingly, rape
victims themselves cannot get their own full set of records related to
their cases. In normal circumstances, the leaking of those transcripts
would be grounds for an immediate investigation of the police and
prosecutors who had access to them. Any official who leaks such
confidential papers faces serious penalties; lawyers who do so can be
disbarred. And yet no one in this case is being investigated or facing
any consequences. It seems quite likely that the Assange documents
were leaked by the police or prosecutors because they got a signal
from higher-ups that they could do so with impunity.
Indeed, these are all major aberrations–suggesting that somebody at
the top has interfered.
And who is at the very top in Sweden? Players working with Karl Rove,
who was a party to the Swedish government’s collusion in the Bush
regime’s rendition/torture program. As Britain holds its hearings into
Julian Assange’s fate, we must take careful note of that connection.
From: Z Net - The Spirit Of Resistance Lives
URL: http://www.
Click here to Reply
 |
On Feb 24, 11:31 am, Morrissey Breen <morrisseybr...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Something Rotten in the State of Sweden: 8 Big Problems with the
> ‘Case’ Against Assange
>
If you do not like the legal system of a country you are going to> Something Rotten in the State of Sweden: 8 Big Problems with the
> ‘Case’ Against Assange
>
visit - then either do not go there or keep squeaky clean. If sexual
violation law and its application is too feminist oriented for your
liking then keep it inside the trousers. 'Do in Stockholm as the
Swedes do'. It is an affront to Western Europe to imply that their
legal systems are inferior to NZ or Australia which is no doubt why
the Australian Foreign Affairs Minister has decided against
intervening at the highest level in the Assange case.
Nations are not going to put their relationships with other nations
and trade at risk by trying to save their overseas travelling citizens
from their own stupidity.
|
- show quoted text -
|
On Monday, 25 February 2013 09:34:31 UTC+13, Mo wrote:
<snip>
>
> Idiot.
Name calling? Poor effort, "Mo".
> You know nothing, and you read even less.
How can one read less than nothing, "Mo"?
<snip>
>
> Idiot.
Name calling? Poor effort, "Mo".
> You know nothing, and you read even less.
|
- show quoted text -
Lazza.
|
On Feb 25, 9:15 am, peterwn <pete...@paradise.net.nz> wrote:
- show quoted text -
with politicians who have chosen to bypass it.
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