Wikileaks Founder Julian Assange Arrested and Faces Rape Charges
Julian Paul Assange, the founder of Wikileaks has been arrested for allegedly raping two women in Sweden. The native Australian claims the allegations are all motivated politically and that he is not guilty of raping the women. Assange leaked diplomatic information through his many websites and is therefore fearful that he may be extradited to the United States.
The women said that they did not have consensual sex with Assange and that he forced his attentions on them, in one instance violently. Assange was in Sweden giving a lecture when he was invited to the homes of the victims. The Court of Appeals has heard the women’s testimony and Assange is now appealing the decision of the district Judge ordering his extradition to Sweden. He is wanted for questioning in Sweden with regard to the rape allegations. One of the women claimed that Assange said he wanted to impregnate women. However, he allegedly said he preferred to impregnate virgins because he would then be assured of being the first to impregnate them.
Assange is not without his supporters who have set up barriers and carried banners in front of the British Royal Courts of Justice. They were asking for Assange to be freed. Assange is currently being held under house arrest at the Ellingham Hall in Bungay, Norfolk, UK.
Another woman that had consensual sex with Assange asked what they would do if she got pregnant. He allegedly told her that Sweden was a great place to raise kids. She also claimed she was railroaded into telling the police about the attack. All she wanted was for Assange to be tested for possible sexually transmitted diseases.
Representing Assange is QC Ben Emmerson who states that there was consensual sex between Assange and one of the women. The woman claimed to have been attracted to him when she saw him appear on television. She said that when she was only partially awake she had consensual sex with him.
Prosecutors in Sweden also charge that even if Assange had consensual sex, since he allegedly didn’t wear a condom, this is against Swedish law. If you have consensual sex in Sweden without a condom, it is punishable by a term of imprisonment of a minimum of two years for rape.
The other woman said sex with Assange was definitely not consensual, and that he treated her violently; he had broken her necklace, tore off all her clothing, and then held her down in such a way so that she was not able to move away from him.
The names of both women were withheld by the Court. Judgment was reserved in this case by Lord Justice Thomas and Mr. Justice Ouseley. A warrant for Assange’s arrest was issued in August of 2010, and he has steadily claimed he did nothing wrong. When the prosecutor said there was no evidence of rape, Assange left the country some eight days later. However, there was another European warrant issued for his arrest on September 1, 2010.
Assange continues to assert that the claims against him are motivated politically in order to eventually extradite him to the United States to stand trial for his Wikileaks actions as the United States government was shocked at the mass leads of diplomatic information.
Federal Poker Indictments Against The 3 Largest USA Poker Casinos
Federal investigators have taken control of the domain names of the three largest online poker companies in the United States: Poker-Stars, Full-Tilt-Poker and Absolute-Poker.
The reason for the domain name takeover is due to their continuing serving casino players within U.S. jurisdiction despite the ban raised on internet poker and gambling, which has resulted in accusations of fraud against financial institutions.
Billions worth of gaming revenue were dramatically impacted after these $3 billion laundering penalties was charged against the companies and defendants. Eleven defendants were charged in New York, including the Poker-Stars, Full-Tilt-Poker and Absolute-Poker founders with fraud, laundering and illegal gambling.
The big three poker casinos are not being singled out in the FBI’s cross-hairs, as five other internet domains hosting poker games were taken over as well. Company assets and their payment processors assets were also included in the complaint and actions were issued in relation to their bank accounts.
As internet gaming has became more and more popular, online poker rode along with a huge burst of popularity despite it’s legality in the USA remaining ambiguous. It is now clear after these actions by the USA government that proving online gambling to USA citizens is a federal crime, causing much anxiety among other casinos serving customers in the USA.
The poker websites that had their domain names taken over now show the warning message “It is also a federal crime to knowingly accept, in connection with the participation of another person in unlawful Internet gambling, credit, electronic fund transfers, or checks”. According to the indictments, fraudulent methods are said to be used by poker companies, including tricking banks to accept credit card payments from these players.
The charges include information on how companies wormed through the 2006 ban, as money received from gamblers are masked and reflected as purchases for online goods or other products that are nonexistent.
Among those who were charged were Isai Scheinberg and Paul Tate (Poker-Stars), Raymond Bitar and Nelson Burtnick (Full-Tilt-Poker), and Scott Tom and Brent Beckley (Absolute-Poker).
Despite knowing that their actions were against the U.S. law, the defendants are said to be aware of their actions, took the risk and continued the scheme until the indictments came down.
Payment processors who were charged along with them were Ryan Lang, Ira Rubin, Bradley Franzen and Chad Elie. They were charged after posing for the poker companies to U.S. banks and doing the cover-up for them by creating pseudo-corporations and websites.
Mass P2P Lawsuits: Names of Copyright Infringers Must Now Be Released
A Washington DC federal judge has changed the fate of P2P (Person to Person file sharing) lawyers, favoring them where mass file-sharing lawsuits are concerned. The judge has let cases move forward and required ISPs to provide names of those involved to be released on schedule.
Common arguments for those opposing such lawsuits include the following reasons:
- Defendants are “improperly joined” by not acting together breaking the law
- People involved in the cases are outside the jurisdiction of the federal court where they are being sued
- The availability of the First Amendment (Right to Anonymous speech)
Judge Beryl Howell of Washington DC rejected the three arguments above – at the moment – in favor of the P2P lawyers who filed the mass lawsuits.
The ruling combines three pending mass lawsuits. The judge also ruled that it was acceptable for a multitude of unknown defendants to be sued noting that they are “logically related”. The judge justifies that individual filing of such cases would cost too much as well as limit copyright holders in protecting their rights. Furthermore, defendants can later on prove themselves to be separate from the rest, but that it would be easier to join them together at the beginning of the investigation process.
Jurisdiction is still vague, where geolocation only tells where these defendants might be. Tools used to look them up are still inaccurate and whether personal jurisdiction would be the best way to go is still up for debate. In the process of the lawsuits, defendants will be given a chance to file for counter motions if they are not within that jurisdiction.
In regard to the reasons why the three opposing arguments were dismissed, the judge ruled the First Amendment was a weak argument since there was only minimal “expressive activity” involved. In favour of the copyright holders, they have good reasons why they want to seek for these violators.
Benefitting from this decision was the US Copyright group, who brought the lawsuits forward. Although separate cases may later be required, as well as the huge amount involved in filing them apart from the time and effort that will be involved, the early stage of litigation was a good indication that despite that only a single judge so far has agreed for such cases to push through, the opportunity paves way for rights holders to seek for justice.
