WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was sentenced Wednesday to 50 weeks in a British prison for jumping bail in 2012. He apologized to the court, but the judge said he had used his “privileged position” to show disdain for British law.
Assange next faces an extradition hearing on Thursday related to a separate and potentially more consequential charge in the United States of
conspiring to hack a government password. Legal experts anticipate the extradition fight
could take years.
Assange, 47, appeared at London’s Southwark Crown Court wearing a black jacket and gray sweater, the bushy white beard seen during his
arrest last month now neatly trimmed. He answered the judge in a quiet voice from behind a glass wall in a bland courtroom packed with journalists taking notes.
The Australian citizen had faced up to a year in a British prison for his bail violation — the maximum penalty for such an offense. He broke his bail conditions in 2012 when he fled to the Ecuadoran Embassy in London after Sweden requested his extradition in a case involving sexual assault allegations, including rape. Assange has denied those accusations.
In court on Wednesday, defense attorney Mark Summers argued that Assange failed to surrender to a British court seven years ago and so violated his bail because he was terrified that if he were extradited to Sweden, he would quickly be handed over to U.S. authorities — and could even be sent to Guantanamo Bay — for his part in leaking a trove of classified government documents.
