" Telling Assange "You're free to go" only to issue an arrest warrant after he left the country is only the start of that shit-show."
yeah, about that....
They never said he was free to go.
In fact, in the first extradition hearing (11 feb 2011) his lawyer admitted that was a lie. he then tried to claim that sure, he arranged an interview with assange on SEptember 21, for the 28th (i think) and it was a total coincidence that shortly after his lawyer was told on the 27th, that assange left hte country, because, you see, he hadn't spoken to assange since the 20th, and couldn't get hold of him until the 29th...
From the court ruling:
Then he was then cross-examined about his attempts to contact his client. To have the full flavour it may be necessary to consider the transcript in full. In summary the lawyer was unable to tell me what attempts he made
to contact his client, and whether he definitely left a message. It was put that he had a professional duty to tell his client of the risk of detention. He did not appear to accept that the risk was substantial or the need to contact his client was urgent. He said “I don’t think I left a message warning him” (about the possibility of arrest). He referred to receiving a text from Ms Ny at 09.11 on 27th September, the day his client left Sweden. He had earlier said he had seen a baggage ticket that Mr Assange had taken a plane that day, but was unable to help me with the time of the flight.
Mr Hurtig was asked why he told Brita Sundberg-Wietman that Ms Ny had made no effort to interview his client. He denied saying that and said he has never met her. He agrees that he gave information to Mr Alhem. He agrees that where he had said in his statement (paragraph 51) that “I found it astonishing that Ms Ny, having allowed five weeks to elapse before she sought out interview”, then that is wrong. He had forgotten the messages referred to above. They must have slipped his mind. There were then questions about DNA. It was suggested to him that a reason for the interrogation taking place in Sweden was that a DNA sample may be required. He seemed to me to at first agree and then prevaricate. He then accepted that in his submissions to the Swedish court he had said that the absence of DNA is a weakness in the prosecution case. He added “I can’t say if I told Ms Ny that Julian Assange had no intention of coming back to Sweden”. He agrees that at least at first he was giving the impression that Mr Assange was willing to come back. He was asked if Julian Assange went back to Sweden and replied: “Not as far as I am aware”.
In re-examination he confirmed that he did not know Mr Assange was leaving Sweden on 27th September and first learned he was abroad on 29th. He agreed that the mistakes he had made in his proof were embarrassing and that shouldn’t have happened."
yeah, his lawyer claims that Ny said he could leave, but forgets conversations, apparently forgets to tell Assange he can't leave, forgot he told Assange that the next day he'll be possibly be arrested, which is coincidentally when Assange left very suddenly (he had no events planned, and I believe he was supposed to stay in Sweden for his residency application)
Also, his own defense expert (Sven-Erik Alhem), after the judge corrects the lies that this lawyer had told him about this stuff, changed from 'this was improper' to 'Why wasn't he in custody as is normal' and then says he would have applied for the EAW himself.
See, the problem is, Wikileaks is great at getting their side out, telling the lies of 'he was free to go' and so on, when he wasn't. Much later, they point tot he stipulations for the later court cases, where all the irrelevant stuff is marked out to avoid litigating trivialities, and they've agreed 'he was ok to go', along with a bunch more stuff that earlier in cases they've pointed out were lies. It's not that they're saying it's true, it's saying it doesn't matter legally to the case, we'll not argue the point any more because we don't want to waste time. The judge, reading the case notes beforehand though, understands that it was a lie, and one they've avoided bringing in as irrelevant nonsense.
it's not cheap rhetoric though, it indicates premeditation and deliberative acts.
if they'd brought a jemmy to force the window, that would, int he same parlance, be a 'special tool'.
If they'd used a slimjim to open cars, that's also a 'special tool'
if you brought something with you to do a job of getting around some impediment to commit a crime, whatever that something is must be special enough to bring, right? And without it you couldn't continue, or you'd have to improvise, being less effective.
or to look at it another way, the only reason you have that item ('special software, or special tool') with you at that time, is to commit that act. I doubt manning routinely packed a liveCD in their fatigues for a days work, just as most people don't carry a slimjim around, 'just in case'.
Now, if it were some software that was on the machine, or that people in manning's job routinely carry around in the ordinary course of business, then it wouldn't be classified as 'special software'. Just like how carrying a knife is bad, but a landscaper can carry a machete in the van no problems, to say nothing about mobile butchers.
its just a legal term, much like how US filings tend to start 'comes now through lawyer defendant zero' or something.
yeah, that was the sideshow bob quote i was trying to call to indirectly...
funnily enough, I just referenced another of Grammar's characters on the Ars story on this, speciflcally General Partridge from Pentagon Wars, and hos edited report on Col Burton's report on the Bradley, much like Barr's version of Mueller's summery.
" If Julian Assange were to pull off a miracle and defeat the US charges, could Sweden still re-file the twice-dropped rape charges against him?"
Yes
The first dropping was just the generic prosecutor not wanting to bother, so it was appealed by a lawyer retained by the women (this is also why anyone claiming the women never wanted him prosecuted are extremely stupid, and have only gotten their info from the wikileaks 'defense' site, which was the only place that ever claimed this) and it went to a specialist sex crimes prosecutor (Ny)
So not really a dropping.
The second 'dropping' is an administrative drop. In that Swedish law requires active cases to be actively pursued. Ny could not take the next step in her case, which was the arrest, the charge/trial, because of the embassy situation. As such because the case was stalemated, she administratively halted the prosecution, making it no longer an active case, but she specifically stated that should the situation change before the statute of limitations expires in August 2020, that she would reactivate the charges.
at no point did I say it had to be written for that express purpose.
it's special in that it was brought in for the purpose. It was deliberately chosen with deliberate premeditation to be used for that purpose, as an external program not usually found on that system.
That's what makes it 'special' in the legal context.
In the ordinary course of work, did manning have need or use of that software on that system? no, then it was "otherwise different from usual" (the adjective definition of special) - see also Special election, special prosecutor, etc. - and thus 'special software'.
it's really not a hard term to grasp, if you don't keep trying to think about it as an elitist coder.
again, not saying its 'special' meaning it's unique or unprecedented.
It's 'special' in that it was software deliberately chosen for the purpose of gaining unprotected access to a system.
It's the fact of being an external program introduced solely for the purpose of committing the alleged crime that makes it 'special', the premediational use, you might say.
it's not from when he went into hiding.
And if it were, at the time he ran, it wouldn't have mattered. The Swedish extradition warrant was filed, and finalized 2 days earlier. No US extradition request would even be considered at that point. The 624 days before the Supreme Court's final ruling, yes then it'd be considered (to a diminishing amount as time went on), but with the rejection of his final appeal, and the SCOTUK setting an extradition timetable, US extradition is a non-possibility.
So, he ran from a thing that couldn't happen, then made up a justification after the fact. And that is fed by his continued lies leading up to that, including lying to his own defense witnesses to extract favourable testimony, which they later recanted in court when the lies were exposed.
I'm pretty sure THAT is what Snow was referring to.
I think it uses 'special' not in that it's wondrous, or whatever, but to imply in a legal sense that it is not the software that would normally be used, but that it was used eSPECIALly for the purpose of attempting to circumvent restrictions.
So it's "special" in the meaning of deliberately chosen, non-usual software picked to do a job the underlying system was not normally used for. Not in that it's extraordinary in its abilities or non-normal in other or ordinary use.
the major difference int he two sides is that in US->UK extradition, the uk government has to provide the evidence that is the basis of the complaint to the uk court during the extradition hearing.
In UK->US hearings, the US does not have to provide that evidence, but it does have to testify that it exists..
I think thats the only imbalance in the 03 treaty.
Of course, the question is, knowing that, and if he actually did fear US extradition, why leave SWeden (which he himself boasted does not extradite to the US for political crimes) for the UK, which has this 'express treaty'.
The only answer I can find that makes sense is that after his lawyer was informed that he was to be arrested the following day at interview, he needed to leave the country fast. There were no flights to Australia that would land before he was late for hte interview (and so would be detained before clearing the international zone, if there were any he could take that day at all); he had ~25 days left on his Schengen visa, which means he could go elsewhere in schengen, but only for nearly 4 weeks before he violates that law. Every other country requires a visa, except the uk, so as a commonwealth citizen, he could stay for 180 days visaless, and hope to run out the clock, especially with a radically different legal system.
And he never feared Us extradition, because he would have run to the embassy sooner, rather than 620 days later, especially as with the final supreme court ruling, it was then too late for a US extradition request to be made, as Sweden's was fully granted and final, meaning his justification for hiding doesn't make sense.
well, theres a requirement for dual criminality.
if you access a protected computer in a contry you commit a crime, if you do it now over international borders, its still a crime, or else any crime could be gotten away with by just doing it over a border.
The reason treason is out, is because it specifically requires you to have given an oath of allegiance to the US, which Assange has never done. You, by definition, can't commit treason against a country not your own.
Remember, Manning was a soldier, operating in an overseas base.
Of course there was physical access, and much of the restrictions are to prevent unauthorised persons accessing it at all if the room is unattended, not bad deeds by one of the rooms operators.
Making a system too locked down to use reasonably might work in, say, an embassy, but in a military base in (I think it was) afghanistan, less so.
There's a lot in this, and as usual, Assange's supporters are busy trying to shape narratives.
I've seen people claiming that any US extradition is a violation of an agreement to not extradite to a country with the death penalty, when it was the [utterlyustandard extradition requirement not to extradite someone facing the death penalty
He's facing one count, of attempting to access a protected computer system (CIA system) by cracking a password, so basically a CFAA violation in conspiracy with Manning. its a violation of 18 U.S. Code § 371. Conspiracy to commit offense or to defraud United States, and 18 U.S. Code § 1030. Fraud and related activity in connection with computers (that's the CFAA)
Now there's some claiming 18 usc 793 (Gathering, transmitting or losing defense information) but that's what Manning was charged with (with its UCMJ version) but its inclusion in para 15B is referential. it's not listed in the charges he's facing.
So under 371 he's looking at 5 years.
under 1030 he's looking at 5 years.
potentially 10 years max, is a LONG way from the death penalty. In fact, there's only two crimes that don't involve physical violence against large numbers of people or government officials in federal land or across state lines, and that's Treason and Espionage.
Treason's out, as he's not a US citizen.
Espionage would have to be a serious case of it to get it.
But there are no espionage charges listed.
The case is more akin to Gary McKinnon or Richard O'Dwyer now, than anything else.
probably the one year I wasn't in/around Aintree during the national (and was in the UK). We'd recently launched a family business just outside Bolton, and we'd stopped for lunch at a pub in Atherton, so my dad and uncle could have a few pints and watch the national. Was an epic meeting, indeed.
I grew up around horse racing in the UK (Regular at Haydock, Aintree racecourse mutiple times a week in the late 90s, even been to the Epsom Derby (and had the tent put up 5 feet from me when they euthanized a horse on track). Of course, I also spent a lot of time in betting shops with my grandparents, and half my scrap paper was betting slips, written on with bookie's pens, and my dad won a regional competition to be their 'top tipster of the year' with horse racing. Hell, I even got taught a song at school about tic-tac men. And yes, my parents even pushed me towards horse riding (unusual given we grew up in Liverpool slums, that made Compton seem nice) with the hope that being small and scrawny might mean I could be a jockey [my 6ft, 200lb ass now laughs at them].
I heard that phrase ALL MY LIFE around races. Literally ALL MY LIFE. It was quite a popular phrase of John McCririck, the freaky horse racing pundit and commentator from Channel 4 racing in the uk.
I'd say bill Mirray is odds-on favourite, while this Dave Johnson guy (who I've never heard of, but then why would I, he plays in those cheap and nasty 'dirt' parks, doesn't he?) is at impossibly long odds, and should probably Shergar himself, before the knackermen come to turn him into glue (or findus lasagna, if you remember 2013...)
"That I don't buy. Any such published list would make YOU the plaintiff in an open-shut defamation case. "
WRONG.
In the US, court proceedings have ABSOLUTE IMMUNITY from defamation proceedings.
So rather than an 'open and shut' case, you have a 'summarily dismissed' case for failure to state an actionable claim, now pay them their defense fees for filing a frivolous and vexatious defamation lawsuit
add that the assault has to be performed by an agent of the government acting under color of authority, removing qualified/absolute immunity. After all, when the local cops are the ones doing the assaulting, then yes, THEN you need the federal oversight. And by the same token, if a free press is so essential they need this kind of protection, the very people they'd most need it from are the government they're supposed to be monitoring.
but not just law enforcement, politicians (Gianforte for instance) or the local road crew who the sheriff would sic on someone and then decline to arrest for lack of evidence. etc.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: Re: Re:
" Telling Assange "You're free to go" only to issue an arrest warrant after he left the country is only the start of that shit-show."
yeah, about that....
They never said he was free to go.
In fact, in the first extradition hearing (11 feb 2011) his lawyer admitted that was a lie. he then tried to claim that sure, he arranged an interview with assange on SEptember 21, for the 28th (i think) and it was a total coincidence that shortly after his lawyer was told on the 27th, that assange left hte country, because, you see, he hadn't spoken to assange since the 20th, and couldn't get hold of him until the 29th...
From the court ruling:
Then he was then cross-examined about his attempts to contact his client. To have the full flavour it may be necessary to consider the transcript in full. In summary the lawyer was unable to tell me what attempts he made
to contact his client, and whether he definitely left a message. It was put that he had a professional duty to tell his client of the risk of detention. He did not appear to accept that the risk was substantial or the need to contact his client was urgent. He said “I don’t think I left a message warning him” (about the possibility of arrest). He referred to receiving a text from Ms Ny at 09.11 on 27th September, the day his client left Sweden. He had earlier said he had seen a baggage ticket that Mr Assange had taken a plane that day, but was unable to help me with the time of the flight.
Mr Hurtig was asked why he told Brita Sundberg-Wietman that Ms Ny had made no effort to interview his client. He denied saying that and said he has never met her. He agrees that he gave information to Mr Alhem. He agrees that where he had said in his statement (paragraph 51) that “I found it astonishing that Ms Ny, having allowed five weeks to elapse before she sought out interview”, then that is wrong. He had forgotten the messages referred to above. They must have slipped his mind. There were then questions about DNA. It was suggested to him that a reason for the interrogation taking place in Sweden was that a DNA sample may be required. He seemed to me to at first agree and then prevaricate. He then accepted that in his submissions to the Swedish court he had said that the absence of DNA is a weakness in the prosecution case. He added “I can’t say if I told Ms Ny that Julian Assange had no intention of coming back to Sweden”. He agrees that at least at first he was giving the impression that Mr Assange was willing to come back. He was asked if Julian Assange went back to Sweden and replied: “Not as far as I am aware”.
In re-examination he confirmed that he did not know Mr Assange was leaving Sweden on 27th September and first learned he was abroad on 29th. He agreed that the mistakes he had made in his proof were embarrassing and that shouldn’t have happened."
yeah, his lawyer claims that Ny said he could leave, but forgets conversations, apparently forgets to tell Assange he can't leave, forgot he told Assange that the next day he'll be possibly be arrested, which is coincidentally when Assange left very suddenly (he had no events planned, and I believe he was supposed to stay in Sweden for his residency application)
Also, his own defense expert (Sven-Erik Alhem), after the judge corrects the lies that this lawyer had told him about this stuff, changed from 'this was improper' to 'Why wasn't he in custody as is normal' and then says he would have applied for the EAW himself.
See, the problem is, Wikileaks is great at getting their side out, telling the lies of 'he was free to go' and so on, when he wasn't. Much later, they point tot he stipulations for the later court cases, where all the irrelevant stuff is marked out to avoid litigating trivialities, and they've agreed 'he was ok to go', along with a bunch more stuff that earlier in cases they've pointed out were lies. It's not that they're saying it's true, it's saying it doesn't matter legally to the case, we'll not argue the point any more because we don't want to waste time. The judge, reading the case notes beforehand though, understands that it was a lie, and one they've avoided bringing in as irrelevant nonsense.
Factually, he was never told he could leave.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: Re: Re: Special
it's not cheap rhetoric though, it indicates premeditation and deliberative acts.
if they'd brought a jemmy to force the window, that would, int he same parlance, be a 'special tool'.
If they'd used a slimjim to open cars, that's also a 'special tool'
if you brought something with you to do a job of getting around some impediment to commit a crime, whatever that something is must be special enough to bring, right? And without it you couldn't continue, or you'd have to improvise, being less effective.
or to look at it another way, the only reason you have that item ('special software, or special tool') with you at that time, is to commit that act. I doubt manning routinely packed a liveCD in their fatigues for a days work, just as most people don't carry a slimjim around, 'just in case'.
Now, if it were some software that was on the machine, or that people in manning's job routinely carry around in the ordinary course of business, then it wouldn't be classified as 'special software'. Just like how carrying a knife is bad, but a landscaper can carry a machete in the van no problems, to say nothing about mobile butchers.
its just a legal term, much like how US filings tend to start 'comes now through lawyer defendant zero' or something.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
To quote Frank Carson "It's the way I tell em"
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: Re: Re:
yeah, that was the sideshow bob quote i was trying to call to indirectly...
funnily enough, I just referenced another of Grammar's characters on the Ars story on this, speciflcally General Partridge from Pentagon Wars, and hos edited report on Col Burton's report on the Bradley, much like Barr's version of Mueller's summery.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re:
yeah, what next? criminalizing ATTEMPTED murder? Since when should you face a judge for attempting to commit a crime, and failing?
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Special
Thank you for that, I'm sure the judge will find that useful
... to line the litter box of assange's cat.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re:
" If Julian Assange were to pull off a miracle and defeat the US charges, could Sweden still re-file the twice-dropped rape charges against him?"
Yes
The first dropping was just the generic prosecutor not wanting to bother, so it was appealed by a lawyer retained by the women (this is also why anyone claiming the women never wanted him prosecuted are extremely stupid, and have only gotten their info from the wikileaks 'defense' site, which was the only place that ever claimed this) and it went to a specialist sex crimes prosecutor (Ny)
So not really a dropping.
The second 'dropping' is an administrative drop. In that Swedish law requires active cases to be actively pursued. Ny could not take the next step in her case, which was the arrest, the charge/trial, because of the embassy situation. As such because the case was stalemated, she administratively halted the prosecution, making it no longer an active case, but she specifically stated that should the situation change before the statute of limitations expires in August 2020, that she would reactivate the charges.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Special
at no point did I say it had to be written for that express purpose.
it's special in that it was brought in for the purpose. It was deliberately chosen with deliberate premeditation to be used for that purpose, as an external program not usually found on that system.
That's what makes it 'special' in the legal context.
In the ordinary course of work, did manning have need or use of that software on that system? no, then it was "otherwise different from usual" (the adjective definition of special) - see also Special election, special prosecutor, etc. - and thus 'special software'.
it's really not a hard term to grasp, if you don't keep trying to think about it as an elitist coder.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: Re: Re: Special
again, not saying its 'special' meaning it's unique or unprecedented.
It's 'special' in that it was software deliberately chosen for the purpose of gaining unprotected access to a system.
It's the fact of being an external program introduced solely for the purpose of committing the alleged crime that makes it 'special', the premediational use, you might say.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: Selfish interest
thing is, this indictment is from 13 months ago.
it's not from when he went into hiding.
And if it were, at the time he ran, it wouldn't have mattered. The Swedish extradition warrant was filed, and finalized 2 days earlier. No US extradition request would even be considered at that point. The 624 days before the Supreme Court's final ruling, yes then it'd be considered (to a diminishing amount as time went on), but with the rejection of his final appeal, and the SCOTUK setting an extradition timetable, US extradition is a non-possibility.
So, he ran from a thing that couldn't happen, then made up a justification after the fact. And that is fed by his continued lies leading up to that, including lying to his own defense witnesses to extract favourable testimony, which they later recanted in court when the lies were exposed.
I'm pretty sure THAT is what Snow was referring to.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: Special
I think it uses 'special' not in that it's wondrous, or whatever, but to imply in a legal sense that it is not the software that would normally be used, but that it was used eSPECIALly for the purpose of attempting to circumvent restrictions.
So it's "special" in the meaning of deliberately chosen, non-usual software picked to do a job the underlying system was not normally used for. Not in that it's extraordinary in its abilities or non-normal in other or ordinary use.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: Re: Re: quite a lot to unpick
the major difference int he two sides is that in US->UK extradition, the uk government has to provide the evidence that is the basis of the complaint to the uk court during the extradition hearing.
In UK->US hearings, the US does not have to provide that evidence, but it does have to testify that it exists..
I think thats the only imbalance in the 03 treaty.
Of course, the question is, knowing that, and if he actually did fear US extradition, why leave SWeden (which he himself boasted does not extradite to the US for political crimes) for the UK, which has this 'express treaty'.
The only answer I can find that makes sense is that after his lawyer was informed that he was to be arrested the following day at interview, he needed to leave the country fast. There were no flights to Australia that would land before he was late for hte interview (and so would be detained before clearing the international zone, if there were any he could take that day at all); he had ~25 days left on his Schengen visa, which means he could go elsewhere in schengen, but only for nearly 4 weeks before he violates that law. Every other country requires a visa, except the uk, so as a commonwealth citizen, he could stay for 180 days visaless, and hope to run out the clock, especially with a radically different legal system.
And he never feared Us extradition, because he would have run to the embassy sooner, rather than 620 days later, especially as with the final supreme court ruling, it was then too late for a US extradition request to be made, as Sweden's was fully granted and final, meaning his justification for hiding doesn't make sense.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: Re: quite a lot to unpick
well, theres a requirement for dual criminality.
if you access a protected computer in a contry you commit a crime, if you do it now over international borders, its still a crime, or else any crime could be gotten away with by just doing it over a border.
The reason treason is out, is because it specifically requires you to have given an oath of allegiance to the US, which Assange has never done. You, by definition, can't commit treason against a country not your own.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
Re: About the use of Linux
Remember, Manning was a soldier, operating in an overseas base.
Of course there was physical access, and much of the restrictions are to prevent unauthorised persons accessing it at all if the room is unattended, not bad deeds by one of the rooms operators.
Making a system too locked down to use reasonably might work in, say, an embassy, but in a military base in (I think it was) afghanistan, less so.
On the post: Julian Assange Arrested On Behalf Of The US, For Trying To Help Manning Crack CIA Password
quite a lot to unpick
There's a lot in this, and as usual, Assange's supporters are busy trying to shape narratives.
I've seen people claiming that any US extradition is a violation of an agreement to not extradite to a country with the death penalty, when it was the [utterlyustandard extradition requirement not to extradite someone facing the death penalty
He's facing one count, of attempting to access a protected computer system (CIA system) by cracking a password, so basically a CFAA violation in conspiracy with Manning. its a violation of 18 U.S. Code § 371. Conspiracy to commit offense or to defraud United States, and 18 U.S. Code § 1030. Fraud and related activity in connection with computers (that's the CFAA)
Now there's some claiming 18 usc 793 (Gathering, transmitting or losing defense information) but that's what Manning was charged with (with its UCMJ version) but its inclusion in para 15B is referential. it's not listed in the charges he's facing.
So under 371 he's looking at 5 years.
under 1030 he's looking at 5 years.
potentially 10 years max, is a LONG way from the death penalty. In fact, there's only two crimes that don't involve physical violence against large numbers of people or government officials in federal land or across state lines, and that's Treason and Espionage.
Treason's out, as he's not a US citizen.
Espionage would have to be a serious case of it to get it.
But there are no espionage charges listed.
The case is more akin to Gary McKinnon or Richard O'Dwyer now, than anything else.
On the post: Horse Race Announcer Sues Over Bill Murray Film That Included His Trademarked Tagline
Re: Re: Re:
probably the one year I wasn't in/around Aintree during the national (and was in the UK). We'd recently launched a family business just outside Bolton, and we'd stopped for lunch at a pub in Atherton, so my dad and uncle could have a few pints and watch the national. Was an epic meeting, indeed.
On the post: Horse Race Announcer Sues Over Bill Murray Film That Included His Trademarked Tagline
I grew up around horse racing in the UK (Regular at Haydock, Aintree racecourse mutiple times a week in the late 90s, even been to the Epsom Derby (and had the tent put up 5 feet from me when they euthanized a horse on track). Of course, I also spent a lot of time in betting shops with my grandparents, and half my scrap paper was betting slips, written on with bookie's pens, and my dad won a regional competition to be their 'top tipster of the year' with horse racing. Hell, I even got taught a song at school about tic-tac men. And yes, my parents even pushed me towards horse riding (unusual given we grew up in Liverpool slums, that made Compton seem nice) with the hope that being small and scrawny might mean I could be a jockey [my 6ft, 200lb ass now laughs at them].
I heard that phrase ALL MY LIFE around races. Literally ALL MY LIFE. It was quite a popular phrase of John McCririck, the freaky horse racing pundit and commentator from Channel 4 racing in the uk.
I'd say bill Mirray is odds-on favourite, while this Dave Johnson guy (who I've never heard of, but then why would I, he plays in those cheap and nasty 'dirt' parks, doesn't he?) is at impossibly long odds, and should probably Shergar himself, before the knackermen come to turn him into glue (or findus lasagna, if you remember 2013...)
On the post: Federal Prosecutors Recommend Paul Hansmeier Spend The Next 12 Years In Prison
Re: Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Stupid Law Making Assaulting Journalists A Federal Crime Revived By Congress
Re: Re: Easy way to fix this
that's a civil action for deprevation of rights.
It's not a criminal action for assault which would remove immunity.
On the post: Stupid Law Making Assaulting Journalists A Federal Crime Revived By Congress
Easy way to fix this
There's a way to make this law better all around.
add that the assault has to be performed by an agent of the government acting under color of authority, removing qualified/absolute immunity. After all, when the local cops are the ones doing the assaulting, then yes, THEN you need the federal oversight. And by the same token, if a free press is so essential they need this kind of protection, the very people they'd most need it from are the government they're supposed to be monitoring.
but not just law enforcement, politicians (Gianforte for instance) or the local road crew who the sheriff would sic on someone and then decline to arrest for lack of evidence. etc.
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