According to the London Daily Mail, the Trump regime intends to use secret evidence against Assange — undisclosed to him and his legal team, wanting them prevented from preparing a proper defense.
He faces 18 spurious charges under the long ago outdated 1917 Espionage Act, a WW I relic, pertaining solely to the war, used to persecute state victims for exposing dirty imperial secrets.
Assange is a journalist, WikiLeaks a publisher, phony charges against him all about wanting truth-telling that conflicts with the official narrative silenced — the hallmark of totalitarian rule.
According to a member of his defense team Gareth Peirce:
“The summary case which we have prepared is a dense document.”
“Mr. Assange has not been given what he must be given, and we are keen to go through this to the best of our abilities to keep with the requests of the court.”
“It is predicated on the underlying evidence that Mr. Assange has not reviewed.”
Britain in cahoots with the Trump regime wants Assange pronounced guilty by accusation.
A rigged process wants him imprisoned longterm, likely never to be free again for publishing uncomfortable hard truths.
What’s going on is a message to other investigative journalists that they risk a similar fate if reveal information the US wants suppressed.
In the US and elsewhere, pre-trial judicial proceedings afford all parties the right to as much information as possible – nothing kept secret except for constitutional protection from self-incrimination.
Defendants and their lawyers have the right to all relevant documents, witness depositions, questions and answers from interrogations, crime scene and other forensic evidence including toxicology results, police reports, “raw evidence,” arrest and search warrants, grand jury testimony, and other relevant data.
The purpose of what’s called “discovery” is to assure judicial fairness.
Prosecutors are prohibited from withholding relevant evidence and related materials from the defendant and counsel.
Unlike film-portrayed crime dramas, actual ones rarely include surprise evidence by any party during proceedings, especially anything introduced near their conclusion.
According to the law dictionary: “The theory of broad rights of discovery is that all parties will go to trial with as much knowledge as possible and that neither party should be able to keep secrets from the other” — to give one side an unfair advantage over the other.
That’s what appears in play against Assange, Trump regime prosecutors wanting no chance that he’ll be ruled innocent and released.
Given his brutal mistreatment, languishing under draconian conditions, ill-fed and denied vitally needed medical treatment, his health greatly deteriorated, he may die from neglect in Britain.
The Trump and Boris Johnson regimes may plan his fate this way — to avoid a possible judicial defeat if US courts support First Amendment speech and media freedoms — what earlier Supreme Court rulings upheld.
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Award-winning author Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected]. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG)
His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”
http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html
Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
