Before we even start, the entire premise is wrong. There are no rape accusations concerning AA. The rape accusation concerns SW. From the UK lower court hearing, citing the Europeaan Arrest Warrant:
1. On 13th – 14th August 2010, in the home of the injured party [name given] in Stockholm, Assange, by using violence, forced the injured party to endure his restricting her freedom of movement. The violence consisted in a firm hold of the injured party’s arms and a forceful spreading of her legs whilst lying on top of her and with his body weight preventing her from moving or shifting.
2. On 13th – 14th August 2010, in the home of the injured party [name given] in Stockholm, Assange deliberately molested the injured party by acting in a manner designed to violate her sexual integrity. Assange, who was aware that it was the expressed wish of the injured party and a prerequisite of sexual intercourse that a condom be used, consummated unprotected sexual intercourse with her without her knowledge.
3. On 18th August 2010 or on any of the days before or after that date, in the home of the injured party [name given] in Stockholm, Assange deliberately molested the injured party by acting in a manner designed to violate her sexual integrity i.e. lying next to her and pressing his naked, erect penis to her body.
4. On 17th August 2010, in the home of the injured party [name given] in Enkoping, Assange deliberately consummated sexual intercourse with her by improperly exploiting that she, due to sleep, was in a helpless state. It is an aggravating circumstance that Assange, who was aware that it was the expressed wish of the injured party and a prerequisite of sexual intercourse that a condom be used, still consummated unprotected sexual intercourse with her. The sexual act was designed to violate the injured party’s sexual integrity.
The framework list is ticked for “Rape”. This is a reference to an allegation 4. The other three allegations are described in box (e) II using the same wording as set out above.
To reiterate, anyone who has even remotely followed this case should have been expected to be aware of at lest what the charges are. Charges #1-3 are concerning AA. Charge #4, the rape charge, is concerning SW.
Craig Murray says:
Yet [AA] later testified that just three days earlier, on 13 August, she had been sexually assaulted by Assange; an assault so serious she was willing to try (with great success) to ruin Julian Assange’s entire life
and...
[AA] has already succeeded in ruining much of the work and life of Assange. The details of the story being pathetic is unimportant. By crying rape, politically correct opinion falls in behind the line that it is wrong even to look at the evidence.
AA did not "cry rape". She stated that she felt very badly after the occsion where they had sex, but never stated she was raped. She never planned to report Assange for herself. She only went to support SW's case. From the interviews, first from AA:
[AA] states that she has felt very badly after the occasion when she and Assange had sex, primarily due to worry that she might have been infected with HIV or some other sexual disease.
Yesterday, [AA] received an e-mail message from [SW] who wondered how she could contact Assange, as she had something important to tell him. [AA] understood immediately what it was about; she contacted [SW] who then related what had happened to her — that she and Assange had had sex, that he did not want to use a condom, etc. [SW] wanted to take this further to the police and [AA] decided to follow along, primarily as support.
Got that? She does not say she was raped. She described what happened and said she felt bad about it, was worried he gave her an STD, went along to support SW and does not desire crime victims services.
Well, gee, what does everyone else say? First off, Julian himself:
[AA] had no accusations, and no one had any intention of going to the police and so on. That is how I expected things to remain until I heard the news in Expressen.
From a journalist who knew Assange fairly well, DB:
then [AA] said: “[SW] has asked me to go to the police with her, and I have decided to follow along and support her in this. But we are not planning to file charges against Julian; we just want to go there and tell our stories.”
Well, the sentence was: ”I think [SW] is telling the truth because I experienced something similar”, said [AA].
When she called me and said “we had sex” and this happened, she did not in any way imply that she had been the victim of sexual assault. In fact, she did not even want to go to the police. But the way she put it was like, “I want to go with, I promised [SW] I would go with her for support” — not that she had any reason to go, herself. And so my impression is that she did not experience anything very serious, but that she had become angry. Roughly: Don't destroy the condom, but not that it was an assault. That was my impression, because she did not want to go to the police for her own sake.
Then she called back and said, as I mentioned, that because she strengthened [SW]’s story with that one sentence, the case became stronger, as she expressed it. That was exactly what she said.… But it was not her case.
DB: So she toned it down a lot as something unpleasant, or something she got angry about — and no intention to file a complaint or pursue the matter further.
Sound like AA planned to file a complaint?
From another Journalist who's worked with Assange, directly citing a conversation with Julian:
But then I called him and asked what was going on. Then he said that she wants me to take a blood test. So then do it, damn it, I said. What’s the problem? He replied, “I can take a blood test, but I don’t want to be blackmailed into taking a blood test. For they are saying that either [SW] goes to the police, or I take a blood test. I can give her that; but I would rather do it of good will than be blackmailed into it.”
Sound like this is about AA? Want more?
JW: No — other than that [SW] had contacted [AA], and that [AA] was very angry on [SW]'s behalf. From my conversation with [AA], I got the impression that [AA] had some kind of sisterly attitude toward the younger woman, that she wanted to help her. And therefore, as I understood it, [AA] wanted to accompany her to the police to find out whether or not it was possible to force Julian to take an HIV test.
How about from one of [AA]'s friends?
Most remarkable, thought [PO], was that [AA] had said that she was not able to move when she and Julian had sex because he held her down. [AA] had said that she had decided to let Julian fuck her until he reached orgasm because that was the simplest solution for her ... [PO]’s interpretation was that [AA] was never afraid of Julian; rather, she felt that she had been subjected to a difficult situation.
The other young woman had wanted to have sex with a condom, but Julian had seen to it that they had sex without a condom against the will of the other woman. [AA] had telephoned [PO] to discuss the matter because she herself did not intend to file a complaint against Julian but wanted to support the other young woman.
...that it had been unpleasant. [AA] thought that not only was it the world’s worst lay, but it was also rough. [AA] had demonstrated with her arms the position she was in when Julian held her. [KB] had thought that it was bad and unpleasant, but nothing more.
[AA] had said that she and the other young woman had decided to go to the police so that the other woman could report Julian for rape, and that [AA] would follow along in support.
It also emerged that the police had also filed charges that concerned [AA], and that the police’s interpretation was that [AA] had also been raped. It was also then that [AA] related that she thought that Julian at first did not want to wear a condom, and that they had wrestled over that, and then [AA] had curled into a ball. Then Julian put on a condom which [AA] believed he later during intercourse had broken, because she had heard a smacking sound. [AA] had heard that sound after Julian had withdrawn from her.
[KB] had sensed that [AA] felt that it had been unpleasant, but not scary or threatening.
Those are the only records in the testimony about the circumstances of [AA] going to the police and her attitudes toward what happened.
To reiterate: Every last piece of testimony in the document is suggestive of AA only wanting to go along to support SW. The fact that Murray is trying to spin her as some sort of rape-crying villain isn't even remotely in line with anyone's testimony. Even Julian's himself.
Again, anyone who feels even remotely competent to comment on this case, as Craig Murray apparently does, should be expected to have read the interviews. And given that Craig Murray is citing things *from* the interviews, I can only conclude that he has, in fact, read them, but is deliberately attempting to mislead the readers about the nature of the case.
There's a word for that: lying.
To reiterate: AA did not think she had been raped. Mind you, she was not at all happy with what he had done:
According to [AA], “everything went so fast”. He tore off her clothes and in the process pulled at and broke her necklace. [AA] tried to put some clothes back on, because it all went so fast and she felt uncomfortable; but Assange immediately took them off again. [AA] states that in fact she felt that she no longer wanted to go any further, but that it was too late to tell Assange to stop, as she had “gone along this far”. She thought she “had only herself to blame”. She therefore allowed Assange to remove all of her clothes.
[AA] sensed that Assange wanted to insert his penis in her vagina right away, which she did not want because he was not wearing a condom. She therefore tried to twist her hips to the side and squeeze her legs together in order to prevent penetration. [AA] tried several times to reach for a condom, but Assange stopped her from doing so by holding her arms and prying open her legs while trying to penetrate her with his penis without a condom. [AA] says that eventually she was on the verge of tears because she was held fast and could not get a condom, and felt that ‘this can end badly’. To my question [AA] replies that Assange must have known that [AA] was trying to reach for a condom, and that he therefore held her arms to prevent her from doing so. After a moment, Assange asked [AA] what she was doing and why she was squeezing her legs together. [AA] then told him that she wanted him to wear a condom before he came in her. At that, Assange released [AA]’s arms and put on a condom that [AA] fetched for him. [AA] sensed a strong unspoken reluctance by Assange to use a condom, as a result of which she had a feeling that he had not put on the condom that he had been given. She therefore reached down her hand to Assange's penis in order to ensure that he had really put on the condom. She felt that the rim of the condom was where it should be, at the base of Assange's penis. [AA] and Assange resumed having sex and [AA] says that she thought that she “just wanted to get it over with”. After a short while, [AA] notes that Assange withdraws from her and begins to adjust the condom. Judging from the sound, according to [AA], it seemed that Assange removed the condom. He entered her again and continued the copulation. [AA] once again handled his penis and, as before, felt the rim of the condom at the base of the penis; she therefore let him continue.
Shortly thereafter, Assange ejaculated inside her and then withdrew. When Assange removed the condom from his penis, [AA] saw that it did not contain any semen. When [AA] began to move her body she noticed that something “ran” out of her vagina. [AA] understood rather quickly that it must be Assange's semen. She pointed this out to Assange, but he denied it and replied that it was only her own wetness. [AA] is convinced that when he withdrew from her the first time, Assange deliberately broke the condom at its tip and then continued copulating to ejaculation.
This event - which other witnesses add other details to, like how AA had curled up into a ball to stop Assange from having unprotected sex with her - is what Murray describes as "consensual sex". Note to women reading this post: you might want to reconsider ever sleeping with Craig Murray. Of course, I guess it shouldn't be surprising that a guy who would leave his wife of 20 years for a woman he met at a lapdancing club in Uzbekistan where he handed her a wad of cash and his business card along with an invitation to be his mistress wouldn't have the most enlightened views on sex.
(As a side note, the depths of Murray's misogyny could fill a book - and they do in fact. His book. But I digress)
[AA] makes it quite clear that it was unpleasant. But the record is quite clear that she did not see it as rape. She proceeded to complain to several friends about his behavior and became increasingly upset being around him - first stopping sexual activity, then moving off the bed onto the floor (the 18th, after he starts rubbing his penis against her), "vomited on several occasions because she thought it was so unpleasant" being there anymore, and ultimately (the 19th) moved altogether out of her own apartment when he wouldn't leave (stop and think for a second of how uncomfortable you'd have to be around someone to move out of your own place). But she clearly did not want to view herself, at least early on, as a victim. More on that later.
(For the purposes of the timeline, the incident in question was on the 13th and the crayfish party on the evening of the 14-15th)
Murray proceeds to go into about as extreme of an example of selective quotation as you can get. He mentions the "I felt like I had been dumped" comment yet omits the entire conversation at the same event with KB, another woman who Assange had been hitting on at the party and tried to go home with. AA told KB about the "unpleasant" sex with Assange, in detail, and then added "that [KB] could take him".
Wait a minute, what was Murray's premise he's trying to promote here?
"Why did [AA] not warn [SW]?"
AA did not know SW, and had only minimal contact with her. But AA *did* know KB, and she *did* warn her.
Again, Murray claims to be quoting the transcripts. If he actually read them (and if not, where is he getting the quotes?), surely he knows this. The only conclusion is, once again: Craig Murray is a liar.
Murray proceeds to do a minor distortion, quoting only AA saying "He can stay with me." Julian *had* been staying with her and had been reluctant to move, as was testified to over and over in the testimony. AA's response that he could stay with her was to:
Then I asked [AA] if it was O.K. if he remained with her, or if she wanted me to take him.
Murray makes it sound like AA was just volunteering out of the blue to take Assange. The actual transcript makes it sound like she doesn't want to impose on a journalist, when she was the one who was supposed to be hosting him while he was in Sweden. There was no "other friend"; it was the same journalist, JW, who AA talked with daily involving coordinating Assange's schedule.
The next part is totally false in so many ways. Murray states:
[AA] takes her to see [AA]’s friend, fellow Social Democrat member, former colleague on the same ballot in a council election, and campaigning feminist police officer, Irmeli Krans.
Except, first off, that's not what happened. First, as mentioned in every last bit of testimony, AA went in support of SW, not the other way around. Secondly, there is no evidence to suggest that AA "took" SW anywhere. Third, they did not go to see Irmeli Krans. They went to the most logical police station (in downtown Stockholm), and the person they saw was Linda Wassgren. She states:
"I, inspector Linda Wassgren, was working temporarily in the reception at the Klara local police station on Friday 20 August 2010, otherwise I work in the field out of the same station. At around 2 pm the same day two women came to the station and wanted to talk and get some advice on two previous events and they were now a little unsure how to proceed."
Good thing that Wassgren didn't happen to have written a comment on a blog post years ago relating to either of the two victims or happen to be in the same political party; otherwise, today we'd be hearing about how she's part of a gigantic conspiracy, too!
Wassgren and Gehlen presented both cases as rape. Krans was *against* calling AA's case rape. Krans only interviews SW, not AA, and is quickly off the case afterwards. Ultimately the police accusations concerning AA are not declared rape.
Third, the "AA's Friend" comment is totally false. This is often reported as "they've been Facebook friends for two years", when in reality what it actually was was that Krans shared an article written by AA on Facebook, and AA wrote a comment. That's it. That's the only contact that they had ever had previously. Think of how many people you've interacted with online in the past several years and then think of how absurd such a standard for "friendship" is, especially considering that Sweden has only 9 1/2 million people in the entire country.
The document linked above was about the conflict of interest analysis of the supposed connections between Krans and AA. They mention that none was found:
Documents from the National Police Board’s internal investigation unit have been brought in and examined. These documents show that the case has been subject to scrutiny by the Prosecution Authority, National Unit for investigation of police cases. According to this investigation, the police officer in question only registered the initial report and interrogated the woman she did not know. She was thus not present when the second woman’s report was registered and she has also not been part of the investigation since then. The Deputy Chief Prosecutor Kay Engfeldt decided against this background on March 22, 2011 not to open a preliminary investigation regarding possible misconduct.
To top it all off, as is evidenced from the comments, Murray's original post read "lesbian feminist police officer". Nothing like accusing someone of being a lesbian without evidence to drum up baseless homophobia-fearmongering... way to classy-up the debate, Craig!
AA does not "sit in throughout" SW's interview, like Murray claims. To quote Wassgren:
“Jag valde då givetvis att samtala med kvinnorna var för sig och bad dem detaljerat att berätta om vad de varit med om.” (I chose the course of talking with the women individually and asked them to tell me in detail about what they have been through.)
The fact that there are no comments or any mentions of AA in SW's interview should make this obvious. The fact that SW's complaint was registered at 4:11 and her interview ran from 4:21 to 6:40 PM with Krans, while AA's complaint was registered with Wassgren at 4:31 PM and she left the police station before 5:45 PM, should also make this obvious. The fact that the conflict of interest summary also makes it clear that this never happened is just icing on the cake.
There is no testimony anywhere to suggest that "[AA] tells [SW] the police can compel Assange to take an HIV test". As well documented, SW was the one who wanted to go to the police; all of the rest of this is simply fantasy from Murray, who has already decided who he wants to be a villain in this story. Then, one of the greatest flights of fancy of Murray:
Krans prepares a statement accusing Assange of rape. [SW] refuses to sign it.
Do you think your readers are stupid, Craig, that they can't read the protocol for themselves?
In the course of the interview, [SW] and I were informed that Julian Assange had been arrested in absentia. After that, [SW] had difficulty concentrating, as a result of which I made the judgement that it was best to terminate the interview. But [SW] did mention that Assange was angry at her. There was not enough time to obtain any further information about why he was angry at her or how this was expressed. Nor did we have time to discuss what had happened afterwards. The interview was neither read back to [SW] nor read by her for approval; but [SW] was informed that she could do so at a later date.
Is that what you call "refusal to sign"? It says nothing of the sort. First off, the standard - which is not even required - is "read and approved". Secondly, the *officer* decided to terminate the interview. SW never objected to any content. Third, it would be quite difficult to "sign" a report which hadn't even been typed up yet.
Oh, well, I'm sure that SW didn't want to cooperate further, right? Like it's not like she'd hire an attorney to push the case forward for her, or that she then consented to a forensic medical report, or anything like that, right? Oh wait, yes she did:
[SW] gives her consent to the acquisition of a forensic medical report.
and...
[SW] wishes to be represented by an attorney whom she will name at a later time.
The women have a legal defender, and his name is Claes Borgström. He is the man who got the case re-opened (more on that later) and who has relentlessly pushed forward the case ever since. Or are we to assume that the women don't know what their own representative is doing? Poor damsels!
Then we get to...
Some days later: [AA] produces a broken condom to the police as evidence; but a forensic examination finds no traces of Assange’s – or anyone else’s – DNA on it, and indeed it is apparently unused.
Craig Murray isn't the only person pushing this bogus claim. It was even cited in the Daily Mail. And it's completely and utterly false. From the police report:
Samtal med SKL
Samtalade med forensiker Anders Nilsson vid SKL för att få ett förtydligande kring DNA proverna.
I tidigare PM har jag skrivit att på kondomen som använts hos [AA] hade de inte hittat DNA. Detta stämmer inte enligt Anders Nilsson. Han sade att de ser "något" men att det inte går att tyda. Det har valt att analysera provet i en mer förfinad metod. Denna metod tar ca. två veckor. Vid det förra PM et var det inte Anders Nilsson jag talade med.
Anders Nilsson förklarade att det inte är mängden DNA som alltid avgör huruvida de kan se DNA. Det finns många anledningar till att de inte får en tydlig bild.
- Något stör analysen såsom smuts mm.
- Små mängder DNA
- Människor ger ifrån sig olika mängder DNA
- Att undersökningsmaterialet har påverkats efter användandet, t.ex. tvättats, torkats av
Detta var några exempel på vad som kan påverka analysen av DNA men det finns fler faktorer som påverkar.
---
Conversation with SKL
Conversed with forensic analysist Anders Nilsson at SKL to get a clarification on the DNA samples.
In the previous PM I have written that concerning the condom used by [AA], they had not found DNA. This is not correct according to Anders Nilsson. He said that they see "something" but that it is impossible to figure out. It has been chosen to analyze the sample with a more refined method. This method takes about two weeks. In the previous PM it was not Anders Nilsson that I spoke with.
Anders Nilsson explained that it is not the amount of DNA that always determines whether they can see DNA. There are many reasons why they can't get a clear picture.
- Something interfering with the analysis such as dirt, etc.
- Small amounts of DNA
- People emit different amounts of DNA
- The study material has been affected by usage, for example, washed, dried off,
These were some of the things that can affect the analysis of DNA, but there are more factors which can influence it.
The results of the second test came back with mtDNA. None of the DNA results have been reported to match or not match Assange; he didn't give a DNA sample before leaving Sweden. There is nothing in the document about the condom "being unused", and just the opposite, there is "something" on it.
Just at a most basic level, are we to believe that a forensic lab can't recognize an unused condom?
Then we get to:
very easy given Sweden’s astonishing “second-wave feminism” rape laws.
Yeah, those crazy Swedish rape laws! Which you can read right here. Oh my god, so radical!
The reality is, as Göran Rudling points out, rape laws are actually harsher in the UK and most other places than in Sweden. For example, in a real-world case he cited where a 15-year-old girl was raped by three men in a row but only resisted with the first one (having given up trying by the end of it), only the first one could be charged for rape.
That said, even in Sweden, having sex with a sleeping girl is still illegal. Three UK courts, including the Supreme Court, found that the charges were equivalent crimes in the UK as well.
Murray continues.
Rape trials in Sweden are held entirely in secret. There is no jury, and the government appointed judge is flanked by assessors appointed directly by political parties. If Assange goes to Sweden, he will disappear itno jail, the trial will be secret, and the next thing you will hear is that he is guilty and a rapist.
Wow! Incredible! And BS!
He'll disappear? Better not tell that to Sweden, who says:
During his stay in jail, he will be able to have contact with the outside world, under conditions that safety and regulations provide. He is in custody because of the danger of flight and therefore will not have any restrictions limiting his right example to watch TV, read newspapers or socialize with other inmates.
Rape trials are held entirely in secret? Huh, might want to correct Swedish law, chapter 5, section 1, which states that all trials are open by default. The only exceptions are under the Secrecy Act, which are much more limited than that in most nations and can never apply to an entire trial.
Wow, judges appointed by the government? Yeah, that would never happen anywhere else. Like, you know, almost everywhere? For example, like all 9th circuit judges and Supreme Court judges in the US?
The "political appointees" claim is about what are known as "lay judges". The "lay judge" system is also used in such banana republics as Austria, Germany, Finland, Japan, and Norway. Lay judges only exist in the lower tiers of Swedish courts (aka, on higher appeals, which Assange would almost certainly do, they would not be encountered), and are a substitute for the jury system. They're "poltical appointees" in that they're appointed by municipal assemblies and county councils. I know Murray would like you to think that the national government of Sweden is picking them, but it's just not the case. They're mostly well-educated senior citizens. A lay judge cannot refuse their appointment without a valid excuse and serves for four years, about one day per month. There are over 8,000 of them in Sweden.
Secondly, of course, it does not matter the evidence is so weak
Yes, such damned weak evidence that two separate Swedish courts held specifically to evaluate the evidence declared it strong. One of which was the Swedish Supreme Court.
By crying rape, politically correct opinion falls in behind the line that it is wrong even to look at the evidence
What sort of person could possibly look at the situation and say political opinion is against Assange? Assange's defense team, with the help of countless people like Murray, has been waging a PR war to lionize Assange and smear the Swedish judicial system and government with outright lies (including Assange's legal team leaking police documents containing details of the alleged victims' sex lives, their families, even the email address of one victim). Assange is overwhelmingly popular in polls around the world and there was even a recent popular TV movie lionizing him (based on a self-aggregandizing yarn Assange spun a while back). In what world is Murray living where everyone is against Assange? Here's an experiment: go to Google News and search for Assange. View all stories and count how many are for and how many are against, and then come back here and claim there's "political correct opinion" against him.
If you are not allowed to know who the accuser is, how can you find out that she worked with CIA-funded anti-Castro groups in Havana and Miami?
Oh, god, this. First off, you're not supposed to be trying accusers of crimes in the court of public opinion. My god, do you know how hard it is for rape victims to come forward to begin with? And you think they're supposed to have everyone and their cousin trying to find ways to smear them online, you think that's part of a proper functioning system?
Secondly, let's take the "CIA agent" thing, which comes from a Counterpunch article - it's that AA wrote articles, which were published in a magazine, which is connected to a group, which a professor says is connected to another group, who is headed by a guy, who a blog says is a CIA agent. And also, she worked with a womens' group in Cuba, who once organized a parade in Florida, where a guy who is accused of bombing a plane marched beside Celene Dion. Therefore, she's a CIA agent! Color me convinced!
Let me try. All we have to do is connect the dots and we can find out who's behind this conspiracy. Let's see.... AA is involved in the same political party as politician and actor Gert Fylking... who voiced a vehicle in the Swedish version of the Pixar movie "Cars"... which was written by Dan Fogelman... who also wrote "Crazy, Stupid Love", starring... Kevin Bacon! My god, Kevin Bacon is behind all this! It all makes sense now!
To finish off, there's this sort of image people like Murray are pushing that the Swedish judicial system is some sort of horrible corrupt conspiratorial organization. Here's the reality: the World Justice Project ranks them the best in the world in terms of fundamental rights. Their weakest category? "Effective criminal justice", aka, they let people off too easily. The World Justice Project's methodology is scientifically peer-reviewed and published, and uses at least 17 experts for the Swedish judicial system alone.
It should be telling that when people want to reach for an example of something negative about Sweden they have to reach for a case 12 years ago, involving two refugees (aka, people with no legal right to be in the country, versus Assange who has no legal right to *not* be in the country), who were incorrectly identified as convicted terrorists and deported. When it came out that they had been abused in custody overseas, they were repatriated, given residence status, and a large financial compensation package.
This is the worst example people can come up with, and it was 12 years ago. Do you have any clue how often that sort of stuff happens in countries like the US, China, Russia, even the UK where Assange fled to? The cases of that kind of abuse are too long to list. Heck, until the Assange case made it politically expedient not to do so, Ecuador was just about to hand a whistleblower over to Belarus where he'd be tortured.
In the half century that Sweden has had its extradition treaty with the US, it has harbored over 400 US defectors, including CIA defector Edward Lee Howard, who was giving secrets to the Soviet Union. You think the US didn't really want to get him? But they couldn't; it's illegal in Sweden to extradite for intelligence crimes. Oh, and the prime minister at the time? Carl Bildt, the same Carl Bildt who's now foreign minister and who Assange treats as his number one enemy in Sweden.
Given how public of a figure Craig Murray is (or to use his preferred name for himself from his book, "William Wallace" (p.232)), given how much attention his blog has gotten, etc, I find it grossly improbable that he doesn't know all of this stuff by now. Given that he's citing quotes from the interview, I find it grossly improbable that he's never read them. Rather, there's a much simpler explanation. I'm hardly the first to say this about the Murray - there's actually an astonishingly large number of people who have pointed this out throughout his career - but to paraphrase him: "I have no difficulty in saying that I firmly believe Craig Murray to be a liar."
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Postscript: Earlier on, I mentioned "more on that later" concerning the concept of someone not wanting to see themselves as a victim. Let me clarify that a bit.
First off, crime does NOT depend on what the victim feels about the crime after it happens. Do you really think that you could lie in the bushes and jump out rape the next person that walked past, and then find out that she had a secret rape fantasy and you get to get off scott free? Sorry, it doesn't work that way. If someone breaks the law, regardless of what the victim says or does, it's a crime. And if the police hear a crime reported to them, they have to investigate.
This article goes into the specific example of law in Washington DC on rape:
In D.C., you could be charged with first degree sexual abuse if you cause a person to submit to a sex act using any of the following tactics: by physically forcing them; by threatening them; by rendering them unconscious; or by drugging them. This crime can be punished with up to life in prison. You could be charged with second degree sexual abuse if you have sex with someone when you have reason to know that they are incapable of knowing what's going on, incapable of saying no, or incapable of "communicating unwillingness" to have sex. This crime can be punished with up to 20 years in prison. In these crimes, the rapist is aware that their victim does not want to participate in the sex act, and does it anyway ("no means no"), or is aware that their victim cannot consent, and does it anyway ("passed out means no").
Misdemeanor sexual abuse requires a less stringent standard of consent. Under D.C. law, the misdemeanor charge applies to "whoever engages in a sexual act or sexual contact with another person and who should have knowledge or reason to know that the act was committed without that other person's permission." This crime can be punished with up to six months in prison.
Here, the standard does not require force, threat, or incapacitation. It doesn't even require penetration—it covers all "sexual contact." The misdemeanor charge only requires the absence of consent. In this crime, the rapist is not aware that the victim is powerless to say no—he is only aware that the victim has not offered a "yes." In D.C., you can go to prison for six months for having sex with someone without gaining their permission—even if the victim did not explicitly say "no."
This sort of thing is quite standard. The accusations in the Assange case are not even equivalent to the misdemeanor example - they're equivalent to the second-degree example, which in DC can be up to twenty years of prison, versus the two years maximum he's facing in Sweden for that particular accusation. Note the distinct lack of anything about "how the victim feels about it afterwards".
The same standard applies in Swedish law, which you can read for yourself. It's about what the accused does given the situation at hand, not what the victim feels about it after the fact.
Law exists to prevent certain kinds of behavior which we as a society find unacceptable. This includes having sex with a sleeping girl to work around her refusal to consent to certain kinds of sexual activity (the accusations concerning Assange and SW).
Secondly, concerning how victims of sexual crime need to behave to have "really been victims". Let us start with this: if you want to try to "trigger" a random rape victim, don't say "He put a knife to my throat and I screamed" or "I ran, bloody, straight to the police station", or any other Hollywood-style rape scenario you might be envisioning. Try this: "I turned my head so I wouldn't have to look at his face and waited for him to finish."
Most rapes are date rapes. You may know that on a conscious level but not fully understand what that means in practice. It means you went into the scenario *liking the guy*. Thinking he was a good person. And suddenly you're put into a situation you just can't comprehend, when they're ignoring what you told them, doing things to you that you explicitly told them over and over again not to do. And you just can't understand it. You're in shock.
In the aftermath, few "run straight to the police". Because Victims Don't Exactly Have "Get Raped" At The Top Of Their TODO List For That Evening. You have no clue how to react. You're confused, in shock. And on top of it all, you don't want to see yourself as a victim. I've known multiple rape victims who even ended up dating their rapist afterwards, just to try to make it seem less like rape. You want to pretend it never happened. Or try to tell yourself it was nothing. It's in the past, I'll just make myself forget about it and move on. You blame yourself. You try to make excuses for your attacker. It can take *months* to get past this and come to terms with what happened.
That SW came to terms with what happened, if one accepts the testimony, in a matter of hours is really damned admirable. She started talking to friends, and being able to admit what happened. This was, I should add, before she met with AA, by the way. For one example among the many that makes it clear that SW was telling people she had been raped before she met with AA:
Then he told me that Julian hade been accused of raping that young woman, [SW]. And that [DB] had spoken with [AA], and that [SW] had spoken with [DB]. And that [AA] was furious about what [SW] had told her — that for one reason or another, she believed what [SW] had said and that they were going to meet.
SW told quite a few people that she had been raped. Including a former boyfriend, SB:
[SB] related that he had a relationship with [SW] for two and a half years. They had lived together during the last year of the relationship. Seth related that it was very important for [SW] that they use a condom, partly to prevent infection but also to prevent unwanted pregnancy.
[SB] said the issue of infection was crucial for [SW] and that, before they had sex the first time, they had both got tested for disease and shown each other the results. They did not have sex without a condom on a single occasion during their two and a half years together. That was completely unthinkable for [SW]. [SB] said that such was their agreement. He said that, as far as he knew, [SW] had never had sex with anyone without using a condom.
[SB] related that he learned about what had happened when [SW] sent an SMS message to him, asking if she could telephone him. He was somewhat baffled, because they had not been in contact with each other for several months. When [SW] called, she immediately asked what [SB] thought of WikiLeaks and Julian Assange. He answered that WikiLeaks seemed positive.
Then [SW] said that she had been raped by Julian Assange, in that he had initiated unprotected sex with her while she lay sleeping. [SW] said that she had asked Assange if he was wearing anything and that Assange had replied, “Yes, you.”
The interviewer asked [SB] how [SW] had reacted to that. [SB] said that [SW] had related that she was shocked and did not know what to do. [SB] said that, given [SW]’s definite views on the use of condoms during sex, he could imagine that she was very shocked and afraid. He knows how important it is to [SW] that a condom is used when she has sex.
[SW] has told [SB] that she could not understand how a representative for WikiLeaks, which does so much good, could be so lacking in respect for another human being.
I probably should have put another "trigger warning" before that last line, which most people would just have skimmed past: "... she could not understand how a representative for WikiLeaks, which does so much good, could be so lacking in respect for another human being." To many a date rape victim, a question just like this sticks in their mind. "Why?" Why would a person who they had thought was a good person do something like that? It feels like you *must* have an answer to it, that you must understand it, because if you don't, it'll just happen again some other time.
Of course, in the mind of people like Murray, rapes are where a creepy looking guy jumps out of the bushes with a knife, the victim kicks and screams and is beaten bloody, then runs straight to the police. While this fits some cases, it is *far* from the majority. Most rapes are quiet. And the perpetrator is a respected member of their community.
To reiterate, the meeting between AA and SW happened after she started telling people that she had been raped. Did the meeting enhance her desire to go to the police? Probably. It certainly was the triggering event for AA, according to the testimony. But this is entirely expected. Most rape victims never report the crime. They don't want to get themselves dragged through the mud as people like Craig have been encouraging doing with these women. But ask any rape victim who didn't report their crime how they would have reacted had they found out that within days of what happened to them, they found out that the same guy had done similar stuff to someone else and see how they respond.
AA wasn't raped. She did not say she was and the charges do not allege that. But, according to the charges and testimony, she did suffer lesser sexual crimes - being pinned down in an attempt to force unprotected sex and two charges of molestation, one involving the condom and one involving the incident on Thursday that caused her to move off of her bed and ultimately out of her own apartment. The testimony presents a consistent picture of someone who went through something unpleasant, tried to ignore it and push it into the past because of her respect for the Wikileaks founder, and became increasingly bothered by it and by additional behavior on the part of Assange as time went on. SW, however, only took a matter of hours to come to terms with what happened to her.
Lastly, to reiterate, even IF SW hadn't had an issue with what happened, even IF she had told Julian, on video, "Thank you, Julian, for F*ing me unprotected while I slept after I told you not to, that's always been my fantasy!" - it would still be illegal. What the victim feels about the crime afterwards has no bearing on whether it was a crime. It's illegal to fuck a sleeping girl.
Got it, Craig?
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Postscript 2:
To repost from deep in the comments section of Craig Murray's blog, this from Göran Rudling (who's actually involved in the investigation and hardly a fan of AA):
A summary of most of false claims in two articles by Craig Murray
This is a list of 15 false claims. Or to be exact. 14 false claims and one insinuation.
In my first comment on 7 Sep, 2012 – 12:28 pm I wrote:
“Until you can show me a statement where prosecutor Marianne Ny says that “the interview was conducted before two witnesses, Irmeli Krans and [AA],” I will regard you as an inventor of stories and a certified xxxx.”
For more than 10 days I have asked Mr Murray to back up his claims with facts that support them and/or sources that supports them. Not one single fact have been shown. Not one single source is revealed. My conclusion is that the claims are all made up.
The claims are made up in a loathsome effort to try to depict the case against Julian Assange as a conspiracy by lesbian feminist activists supported by state-feminist dominated Swedish authorities that for some unknown reason wants Julian Assange killed by US authorities. Sure. Well thought out. Oooh. I’m sooooo scared.
Instead of Mr Murray showing facts and sources he now wants me to show him the real facts of the case. “Make a time line.” Something I am happy to do on the condition that Mr Murray simply states that all the claims below are false and reveal the sources that contain all this unreliable and false information. We will never get the true facts of the case until we can determine what sources contain made up stories and false claims.
I have also noted that Mr Murray has great problems in finding out what is in two paragraphs of police interviews. I cannot say that I am convinced Mr Murray will do better if I gave him twice as many.
Mr Murray’s 14 false claim.
There is just a short comment to each one.
1 “[SW] refused to sign her statement”
Not true. Evidence: Interrogators’ note [SW]’s statement
2 “[SW] have not signed her statement to this day”
Not true. On 2 September [SW] was re-interviewed. Extremely unlikely that the interview was approved during this interview.
3 “The prosecutor told the British High Court that [AA] and Irmeli Krans were witnesses to [SW]’s interview.”
Not true. There is not one shred of evidence suggesting this is true. Mr. Murray have been asked repeatedly to show evidence. Have flatly refused.
4 “[AA] did not take [SW] to the nearest and best police station.”
Not true. Klara Närpolisstation was the nearest and best police station to go to.
5 “Rather than see another officer, the two women waited two hours until Krans came on duty.”
Not true. Evidence: Memo Linda Wassgren
6 “[AA] was present throughout Krans’ interview of [SW]”
Not true. There is not one single piece of evidence that indicates this. All evidence shows just the opposite.
7 “[AA] did not report Julian until two days after she had sat through [SW]'s interview with her friend Krans.”
Not true. Evidence: [AA]'s police complaint
8 “The Klara Närpolisstation does have video-taping facilities.”
Not true. Evidence: Interview Chief of Klara Närpolisstation
9 “Rape trials in Sweden are held entirely in secret.”
Not true. No trials in Sweden are in secret
10 “[SW]’s statement alleging rape was drawn up by Irmeli Krans in [AA]’s presence.”
Not true. There is no evidence that suggests that [AA] was present at Klara Närpolisstation between 18:40 and 19:28 when statement was finished
11 “[AA] discussed with Julian Assange his desire for sex with [SW]”
Not true. There is no evidence that suggests that this is true
12 “[AA] took [SW] to her campaigning feminist friend, policewoman Irmeli Krans, in order to twist [SW]’s story into a sexual assault”
Not true. The choice of the police station was the best and nearest. There is nothing in the police interview that is “twisted” in order to make it into a sexual assault. If there is anything, it is just information pointing in the other direction
13 “Sweden has astonishing “second-wave feminism” rape laws.”
Not true. Sweden’s laws are 120 years behind Canada’s and many years behind England’s, Australia’s etc.
14 “Some days later than 22 August (25): [AA] produces a broken condom to the police as evidence;”
Not true. Evidence: Evidence report. Condom was picked up by Sara Wennerblom on 18:12 August 21
15 “If you are not allowed to know who the accuser is, how can you find out that she worked with CIA-funded anti-Castro groups in Havana and Miami?”
A silly insinuation that an accused like Julian did not know who his accusers are.
In ten days not one single piece of evidence shown by Mr Murray that supports his claims. Pathetic. Don’t think it is ever gonna come.
Göran Rudling
ReplyDeleteA couple more words there and you might have a complete sentence.
Delete