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Original Content at https://www.opednews.com/articles/The-Empire-Versus-the-Two-by-Darren-Wolfe-110114-487.html (Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher). |
January 15, 2011
The Empire Versus the Two Julians, Assange and Heicklen, and the Anti War Activists
By Darren Wolfe
The US government is charging FIJA activist Julian Heicklen with jury tampering. They may be doing this to keep us from informing juries of their power to find dissidents such as Assange and the anti war activists not guilty regardless of what the law says.
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The US government really wants Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. They're mad at him for releasing video of the military's murder of civilians in Iraq and more recently a list of sensitive diplomatic cables too long to get into here. A grand jury has been empaneled in Alexandria, VA to consider criminal charges against Assange. He may never be extradited to the US for trial, but what if he is?The FIJA mission is to educate Americans regarding their full powers as jurors, including their ability to rely on personal conscience, to judge the merit of the law and its application, and to nullify bad law, when necessary for justice, by finding for the defendant.The US government is also after a number of anti war activists. The FBI raided their houses and an office in Minneapolis, Chicago, Michigan, and North Carolina last September after sending in an agent to infiltrate and spy on them. Twenty-three people have been issued subpoenas. The first are scheduled to appear before grand juries on January 25, 2011. As this author pointed out in "Jury Nullification May Be The Only Salvation For The Antiwar Activists":
Given that we live in an age when it has been said that "A good prosecutor could get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich." It is sadly very likely that indictments will follow. If this is the case jury nullification may be these activists only salvation.The prospect of not being able to convict opponents of its tyranny must be terrifying to the government. There is no better way to stop FIJA activists from educating jurors and, therefore, keeping dissidents free than to start charging them with felonies for their activism. This may be why they are now charging FIJA activist Julian Heicklen with jury tampering. Professor Heicklen is a long time activist and leader in educating juries. He has been harassed and arrested many times for handing out FIJA literature at federal courthouses, especially the one at 500 Pearl Street in New York City where he has to appear for a hearing on January 24, 2011.
"the summons does not include any deposition from the accuser, so that I do not know the specific incident that is involved. The summons states that there is only one charge, but gives no particulars, including a date, time, location of the incident, names & dates of jurors tampered, & how tampered.Having been to several of these FIJA outreach events with Julian Heicklen myself I'm quite suspicious of these charges. Not once have I seen him tell a juror how to vote on a case. He merely hands out fliers to all passersby. His prosecution can be seen as nothing more than an attempt to squash our efforts to educate juries on how they can check tyranny with jury nullification. No doubt the government will be most upset if they try Assange or the anti war activists only to have them set free by a jury bent on justice. To make sure that happens we have to make sure that first Julian Heicklen is found not guilty. Whatever your political views, show your support for him. Come to his hearing on the 24th if you can. Together we can defeat this tyranny.
Darren Wolfe is the former Eastern Vice Chair of the Libertarian Party of Pennsylvania. He presently blogs as the International Libertarian http://www.theinternationallibertarian.blogspot.com/ His articles have also appeared in Ammoland.com, American Juror, OpEdNews.com, the Libertarian Penn, and the Nolanchart.com. News services such as the New York Post.com and Rational Review have published links to his work. Darren is the Philadelphia area contact for Come Home America (http://comehomeamerica.us/), a politically neutral peace movement. Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/IntLibertarian