Two US federal prosecutors connected to the Justice Department’s case against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange disagreed with the department’s decision to seek espionage charges against Assange, arguing that the charges “posed serious risks for First Amendment protections”, The Washington Post reported Friday.
The Post cited people familiar with the matter as claiming James Trump, “one of the assistant US attorneys asked to evaluate the case” against Assange, and Daniel Grooms, who served as criminal chief in the US Attorney’s office managing the case, disagreed with the Justice Department’s decision to charge Assange under the Espionage Act.
The paper reports that while reviewing the case, James Trump “was concerned about pursuing a prosecution that was so susceptible to First Amendment and other complicated legal and factual challenges.”
However, by the time the US Justice Department charged Assange on Thursday, the two prosecutors were no longer involved with the case.
Grooms was reported to have left the department last month “for unrelated reasons,” while James Trump, who “offered to remain on board in whatever capacity his supervisors wanted after delivering his opinion,” has moved to other casework.
While noting that it was not unusual for prosecutors to disagree on whether a particular case merits criminal charges, the Post writes that this particular disagreement “involved major questions about constitutional rights.”
When an attempt was made to reach out to the two prosecutors for comment, Grooms declined, while James Trump referred to Joshua Stueve, a spokesman for the US Attorney’s Office in Alexandria, Virginia, who told the paper in a statement that they “do not respond to anonymously-sourced statements”.