WATCH: The CIA Suit & New Proof It Spied on Assange

NOW WITH TRANSCRIPT! New files found in a Spanish court confirm C.I.A. spying on Julian Assange in Ecuador’s embassy. Watch press conference here by plaintiffs who’ve sued the C.I.A. for also spying on them while visiting Assange. 

The plaintiffs, all U.S. citizens who visited Julian Assange in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, claim in their lawsuit against the Central Intelligence Agency and former Director Mike Pompeo that their devices were surveilled at the embassy while seeing Assange.

The C.I.A. has filed a motion to dismiss the case, but new evidence has emerged in a Spanish court case that provides further proof that the Spanish security company UC Global was contracted by the C.I.A. to spy on Assange 24/7 and on his visitors, including on privileged conversations with his lawyers.  

New files were discovered by Assange’s lawyers in Madrid that give direct evidence that UC Global was working for the C.I.A. Previous testimony in the case had only mentioned a U.S. “intelligence agency” or the “American friends.” The newly discovered files, first reported by El Pais, were withheld by the Spanish police. Pompeo was subpoenaed by the court in June 2022 but has refused to turn up.

The plaintiffs in the case, American journalists and lawyers, are attorneys Margaret Ratner Kunstler and Deborah Hrbek and journalists John Goetz and Charles Glass.

Kunstler and Hrbek were joined by their attorney Richard Roth at the press conference live on CN Live! 

TRANSCRIPT

PRESS CONFERENCE June 7 2023: Assange Attorneys Suing CIA for Illegal Searches Respond to CIA Motion to Dismiss.

Discuss explosive new revelations from El Pais about spying on Assange and attorneys at Embassy of Ecuador in London

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngmAkZr9xfQ

TRANSCRIPTION

00:07:22:23 – 00:07:53:21

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Welcome, everybody. Thank you so much for joining us for this Zoom press conference. The title of the press conference is the fact that attorneys and journalists that are suing the CIA and former agency director Michael Pompeo for illegal searches were citing explosive new revelations that have recently come out. And we’re going to be urging the judge to deny motion to dismiss, and entertain new evidence of CIA illegal activities inside the Ecuadorian embassy.

00:07:55:05 – 00:08:22:08

Trevor Fitzgibbon

I’m going to be turning it over to to start things off to Richard Roth from the Roth Law firm who is representing the plaintiffs. He’s going to be providing an outline and an explanation as to what is happening right now. After that, we’re going to turn it over to one of the plaintiffs, Deb Hrbek, who is also a media reporter who went to visit Mr. Assange inside the Ecuadorian embassy as well.

00:08:22:19 – 00:08:48:18

Trevor Fitzgibbon

And then we’re also going to hear from Ben Cohen, who is an activist and is a representative and a spokesperson for Assange Defense, here in the United States. He, as well as Deb and the other plaintiffs, also went to visit Julian Assange inside the Ecuadorian embassy. Then we are going to open it up for a brief Q&A for any journalists who would like to ask questions.

00:08:50:14 – 00:09:05:13

Trevor Fitzgibbon

All you need to do is just ping me, Trevor, in the chat and I’ll make sure we call on you so that you can get your questions asked. Again, thank you very much for being here. And with that, I’m going to turn it over to Mr. Roth.

00:09:07:08 – 00:09:52:19

Richard Roth

Thank you, Trevor. And thank you, everyone, for taking part; listening to what we think is pretty startling news. As you probably all know, on January 23rd, 2023, we started a litigation. We, meaning the plaintiffs were Debra Hrbek and Margaret Kunstler, who are on the phone. I’m on the zoom, as well as Charles Glass and John Goetz,against the CIA, Mike Pompeo and a company called UC Global for essentially violating their Fourth Amendment rights because unbeknownst to these four individuals, when they went into the Ecuadorian embassy in London, when they handed their phones, their laptops, their computers over to the authorities there, everything was being imaged.

00:09:53:06 – 00:10:13:11

Richard Roth

And in the rooms there was a tape recording. There was there was microphones and cameras, unbeknownst to them, notwithstanding the fact that two of the people are lawyers and two of them are journalists. And it’s a clear violation of U.S. individual’s right to privacy. Right. You need a search warrant in this country, whether you’re in the country or not.

00:10:13:23 – 00:10:39:00

Richard Roth

So we started a lawsuit on January 23rd of this year against the CIA, claiming all kinds of violations, including the violation of the search and seizures. And the CIA met us with an opposition, a motion to dismiss, claiming they can’t be sued. And one of their main focuses on the motion to dismiss is that the allegations that were made are just insufficient.

00:10:39:00 – 00:11:18:00

Richard Roth

We couldn’t really, the plaintiffs couldn’t draw nexus to bring the CIA into this as a defendant, because under Iqbal, the U.S. Supreme Court case dated 2009, you need concrete facts upon which you’re going to rely, to prove that the CIA and Mike Pompeo were actually involved in this totally inappropriate conduct. In the complaint, we did allege that Mike Pompeo, when he was first actually anointed as director of the CIA in his very first speech, he called Julian Assange and WikiLeaks a non-state hostile intelligence service.

00:11:18:06 – 00:11:53:07

Richard Roth

And it was very clear from the onset that he actually had a real grind with Mr. Assange and WikiLeaks. We also allege in the complaint that, in fact we believed – some of which is upon information and belief – that UC Global, which is essentially a company that does searches and does security, and the CIA met, and the CIA essentially hired UC Global to, in fact, have it provide the CIA information that was going on in the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

00:11:53:16 – 00:12:23:09

Richard Roth

The allegations were in the complaint. We believe them to be true and we are there. And the motion to dismiss essentially provides in part that we have not alleged sufficient information. Number one is we think we have, but what’s come out in the last several weeks is, for lack of a better word, explosive. And by that, I mean, as all of you know, there’s a parallel lawsuit going on in Spain, in Madrid, in which it involves many of the same people, including the CIA and UC Global.

00:12:23:18 – 00:12:54:01

Richard Roth

And what we’ve learned from the press – El Pais is a main Spanish press. They have been following this litigation closely – What we’ve learned as recently as this week is that there is information that was provided to the court by UC Global to lead us to conclude that the CIA was actively involved in the solicitation of UC Global to in fact, have it engage in its inappropriate conduct.

00:12:54:01 – 00:13:14:11

Richard Roth

And the reason why we know that is because documents were turned over in Spain. And we’ve been, if you read the El Pais press, you will see, as we see again this week, and there’s articles coming out every week, that there are files, there are actually CIA files of UC Global. There’s all kinds of things going on in the Spanish proceeding.

00:13:14:18 – 00:13:40:05

Richard Roth

So for the CIA to allege that, in fact, we don’t have that nexus is somewhat, call it naive or just call it wrong of it. So what we’ve done is with the motion to dismiss that was filed a couple months ago today, we filed a papers in opposition to the motion to dismiss that said, number one on the CIA and Pompeo can’t get out of this so quickly.

00:13:40:12 – 00:14:10:18

Richard Roth

Number two, we have a nexus. We’ve shown the nexus in the complaint. And number three, to the extent that we don’t have a nexus, we now have information from the press in Madrid, which will give us more than ample information to amend the complaint, if necessary and give very excruciating details of how the CIA, yes, our Central Intelligence Agency, was actively involved in learning information, wrongfully learning information against Julian Assange.

00:14:10:23 – 00:14:32:10

Richard Roth

And the irony here, the ultimate irony here is that Julian Assange is imprisoned in a maximum security facility in Belmarsh in London, and he was in the Ecuadorian embassy because the CIA blamed him for engaging in wrongful information [gathering] when it, in fact, is engaging in doing far worse than he ever did as a publisher.

00:14:32:16 – 00:14:54:18

Richard Roth

So the reason why this case is important is not only because these individual plaintiffs’ rights were violated, because they were in the embassy, but really the entire theme here puts a very big scare on any reporter, any investigative reporter who gets information, who should not have to worry about the CIA coming after it for disclosing that information.

00:14:54:18 – 00:15:12:08

Richard Roth

It’s done every day with Fox News. It’s done every day with The New York Times and it was done all the time with WikiLeaks. So we are in a fight. But what’s the reason for the today’s press conference? Number one, we put papers in. And number two, what we’re learning from the Spanish courts is, quite frankly, startling.

00:15:12:22 – 00:15:32:08

Richard Roth

I will turn it over to Deb, because Deb, as the plaintiff has been actively involved and is also a lawyer. And what we’re learning from the El Pais articles is not only startling, but very troubling, that our CIA is doing this to our citizens and others. Deb, I’ll turn it over to you.

00:15:34:08 – 00:16:12:15

Debra Hrbek

I am Debra Hrbek, a media lawyer, not a media reporter. Unfortunately, it was my dream to be a reporter, but I’m only a lawyer. So we started this action in August 15 [2022], basically as a result of the revelations from El Pais, which is essentially, as many of you know, Spain’s paper of record. And the initial revelations were interesting enough, that came as a result of whistleblowers in a private criminal prosecution that is still pending in front of the High Court in Spain.

00:16:13:01 – 00:16:49:05

Debra Hrbek

And basically whistleblowers from UC Global reported on the fact that Dave Morales had been engaged by the CIA and was basically acting as an agent of the CIA as they ramped up the the surveillance that was underway at the Ecuador embassy when Julian Assange was there. And the more recent revelations from just this past Sunday is the El Pais article that Richard alluded to, we suspect, are just the tip of the iceberg.

00:16:49:06 – 00:17:30:06

Debra Hrbek

In that article, it turned out that after two years of plowing through disclosures, that it became apparent through sort of a glitch, it became apparent that over 210 gigabytes of information that had been seized during a raid of UC Global’s office immediately following Mr. Morales’s arrest, had been not not turned over as they were required to be in the Spanish criminal proceedings against UC Global and David Morales.

00:17:31:04 – 00:18:09:19

Debra Hrbek

So this is entirely new information which the media is just starting to dig into. And we suspect there’ll be a lot more to come. And the interesting thing to me is that the CIA and Mr. Pompeo, who are the defendants in our case, are alleging that they have nothing to do with this little Spanish firm run by a sort of mercenary rogue, David Morales, who were wholly engaged by the Ecuadorian government just to provide security.

00:18:09:19 – 00:18:38:20

Debra Hrbek

And if they went off the reservation, that was nothing to do with the CIA. If you actually look at the timeline of some critical events in December of 2017, we’ll see that that is absolutely impossible, that that’s the case. Essentially what happened was that – and really an even better source for this is an earlier short documentary produced by El Pais that came out just a few weeks ago that I would urge everyone to find.

00:18:38:20 – 00:19:32:21

Debra Hrbek

But basically in that documentary, we see that prior, it wasn’t really known widely before, but essentially in December of 2017, things were heating up and Ecuador wanted to help Mr. Assange to leave the embassy, which because it was interminable what was going on there. And what they did was they secretly hatched a plan to grant him citizenship, bestow diplomatic status, so that he could leave the embassy under the protection of the diplomatic status that would be bestowed upon him, which other countries are required to respect under the Vienna Convention, and therefore enable him to leave the embassy and get out of the UK safely and to a country where he could act as a diplomat and live freely.

00:19:33:12 – 00:20:16:17

Debra Hrbek

That happened on December 21st, 2017, on the very same day an international criminal arrest warrant was issued by the US Department of Justice, and was delivered the following day on December 22nd, 2017, to the Government of Ecuador to tell them that the UK – this was the Americans telling Ecuador – that the UK would not be acknowledging or respecting the diplomatic status to be conferred on Julian Assange.

00:20:16:17 – 00:20:38:02

Debra Hrbek

And this basically scuttled the plan. He was to leave on Christmas Day, December 25th 2017, and that just could not happen because it was made very clear by the UK and the US government to Ecuador that he would be arrested if he left the embassy, despite the sovereign nation’s bestowing of a diplomatic status on him.

00:20:38:10 – 00:21:09:06

Debra Hrbek

And really interesting, we have an admission by one of the defendants, Michael Pompeo, in a recent memoir in January of this year. His memoir came out and on page 227, he talks about how on December 23rd 2017, two days after they learned of the plan for Mr. Assange to leave the embassy, one day after the arrest warrant had been delivered, Mr. Pompeo says that he was sitting with his family and perusing, as you do I suppose, the CIA guidelines on extrajudicial killings.

00:21:10:09 – 00:21:42:13

Debra Hrbek

Now, this taken together with the Michael Isikoff article in September of 2021 in Yahoo! News that documented very thoroughly that the CIA was planning to kidnap or even assassinate Mr. Assange, shows that this was not a rogue Spanish private security company.

00:21:42:13 – 00:22:03:24

Debra Hrbek

They had, nobody I know has a direct line to the DOJ and the CIA and be able to get that kind of information into the sort of hands that can turn around an international arrest warrant that quickly. It just doesn’t add up. So with that, I ask you to please keep an eye on El Pais.

00:22:04:11 – 00:22:22:18

Debra Hrbek

They’ve been doing some fantastic reporting and we really hope that the American press starts paying attention. It’s the responsibility of our press in the United States to hold our government to account. And it is shameful how appalling the coverage has been in the mainstream media in the United States. Thank you, Trevor.

00:22:23:12 – 00:22:52:08

Richard Roth

And before we proceed let me just tell everyone, I put in the chat the English version of the El Pais article. You can see it just came out and it essentially says that there’s more than 250 extra gigabytes of files relating to the surveillance of WikiLeaks that were finally found. And it goes through how Mr. Morales at UC Global had files on his laptop that were called CIA.

00:22:52:14 – 00:23:11:11

Richard Roth

The CIA disclaims any connection with the UC Global. Yet produced in Spain are UC Global’s files that have CIA on it and the article provides a lot of information, and we believe there’s a lot, as Deb said, there’s a lot more to come.

00:23:13:09 – 00:23:30:24

Trevor Fitzgibbon

It’s not a good look for our agency, for the CIA. With that, I want to turn it over to Ben Cohen, who’s been a long time activist and supporter of Julian and has visited him inside the the embassy in London. Ben, why don’t you say a few words?

00:23:32:04 – 00:24:07:04

Ben Cohen

Sure. You know, this is yet another example of the illegal activities our government is undertaking to punish a publisher that revealed illegal government activities. So the government undertakes illegal activities, somebody reveals them, and then the government will take more illegal activities to silence that person. You know, my understanding is that the purpose of a free press is to hold government accountable.

00:24:07:17 – 00:24:42:13

Ben Cohen

It’s not about clicks. It’s not about hits. It’s about getting the truth out there. And in this case of Julian Assange, I always thought that you’re innocent until proven guilty. But in this particular situation, Julian Assange is already being punished. He’s already being punished in this situation. Julian’s already being punished despite the fact that he’s never been convicted.

00:24:43:10 – 00:25:21:07

Ben Cohen

He’s been in solitary confinement for four years, according to most any authority. The World Health Organization, the U.N., the Association of Prison Physicians, keeping someone in solitary confinement for over two weeks is torture. And he’s been in solitary confinement for four years.

00:25:24:03 – 00:26:21:00

Ben Cohen

You know, if you look at what England has done previously in terms of holding people awaiting extradition, there’s another good example of the Chilean dictator Pinochet, who actually did commit war crimes. And he was allowed to remain in a mansion under house arrest. So for some reason, they’re treating Julian quite differently. And clearly, what they’re trying to do is to make an example of him and say that any journalist anywhere in the world, regardless of what country you’re a citizen of, if the U.S. doesn’t like what you’ve published, the U.S. can then prosecute you.

00:26:22:11 – 00:27:00:03

Ben Cohen

That’s absurd. I mean, that’s the end of government accountability. So, and then you have the actual situation of what Julian did. I mean, he revealed war crimes. We know who the people are who committed those war crimes, and yet they get off scot free while the person who revealed them is being tortured. Kind of an open and shut case of shoot the messenger.

00:27:10:17 – 00:27:49:05

Ben Cohen

Well, I just wanted to finish with, Biden likes to say that he believes in freedom of the press and he’ll grandstand and make all these pronouncements about condemning other countries around the world that are throwing journalists in prison for printing the truth or printing information that a particular government doesn’t like. Biden neglects to mention that his administration is seeking to put a journalist in prison for printing the truth and keep him there for the rest of his life.

00:27:50:22 – 00:28:12:13

Ben Cohen

You know, Obama refused to do that because of what he called the New York Times problem. If he were going to prosecute Assange, he’d need to prosecute The New York Times and any other publication that publishes information like that. So he refused to do it. Then Trump came into office and he said, Well, I’m going to prosecute Assange.

00:28:13:01 – 00:28:33:24

Ben Cohen

He had a pretty freewheeling interpretation of the law. And now Biden is just following in Trump’s footsteps. So this is an opportunity for the free press of the world to hold the U.S. accountable for this grave injustice. Thanks.

00:28:34:20 – 00:28:53:00

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Thank you. Thank you very much. Okay. With that, we’re going to open it up for some questions for any anybody, any journalist out there who has a question for our guests. Please let me know in the chat. Our first question is going to go to Joe Lauria from Consortium News. Joe.

00:28:53:24 – 00:29:14:13

Joe Lauria

Thank you very much Trevor, and question. Two questions, for Richard Roth first. I’m not sure that the actual contract that Morales and UC Global may have signed with the CIA has surfaced in Discovery. Is that important that he was paid for it or is simply working to surveil Assange in the embassy on behalf of the CIA, is that enough?

00:29:14:19 – 00:29:40:02

Joe Lauria

And secondly, if I read the CIA’s motion to dismiss correctly, they’re not only talking about the failure, your failure to provide that secure nexus – which just new information that’s emerged certainly bolsters for you on your part – but are they also questioning jurisdiction, that this took place on Ecuadorian territory inside the United Kingdom. Is that something you’re addressing? And could you talk about that issue of jurisdiction as well as the contract?

00:29:40:03 – 00:29:40:12

Joe Lauria

Thank you.

00:29:41:03 – 00:30:02:18

Richard Roth

Sure. Sure. Bunch of questions there. Well, let me deal with that jurisdiction first. Yeah, I’m not worried. Jurisdiction is not a problem because quite frankly, we have, and it’s in the complaint, we have proved that the CIA’s New York office actually was involved in it, at least as alleged in the wrongful conduct. And we have two plaintiffs who actually are New York residents.

00:30:02:18 – 00:30:23:20

Richard Roth

I’m not really, I’m not worried about jurisdiction. The CIA has jurisdiction against them in all states, as well as Pompeo. As far as the contract, we don’t know if there’s actually a written contract between the CIA and UC Global. I would suspect there wouldn’t be. I don’t think there’s going to be “you’re going to spy on Assange and we’re going to pay you for it”.

00:30:23:21 – 00:30:40:19

Richard Roth

I don’t think that exists. But we don’t need that. When you look at contract law, you really look at the actions of the parties. The actions of the parties, they’re so much more important. I may not sign a contract, but if I provide you ten bricks a day for ten days, you know, that was your right, my obligation.

00:30:40:21 – 00:31:14:21

Richard Roth

It’s the same thing here. If UC Global has CIA files and is doing surveillance of Assange – why would they have CIA files? There’s no relationship, but for the fact that they are a surveillance company and the CIA wants them to surveil for them. So what we’re learning is, and what we’re going to continue to learn from El Pais and the Spanish proceeding, is that, in fact, whether there’s a formal agreement or not is irrelevant if, in fact, the CIA employed UC Global.

00:31:14:21 – 00:31:43:11

Richard Roth

And yes, we’re going to also look at financial statements and financial documents as well. If the CIA employed UC Global, no matter what way, and that UC Global was providing, as we understand it, direct [audiovisual] feed – not only were they taking the imaging of the laptops, but they’re providing direct feed to Washington. Could you imagine, Julian Assange is meeting with his criminal defense lawyer to defend a case against the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington, and Washington is listening to the conversations he has with his lawyer?

00:31:43:17 – 00:32:08:04

Richard Roth

I mean, you want to talk about violating the Fourth Amendment. You want to talk about violating attorney client privilege. So once we find that and we have clear indication that it’s there, we believe that the court is going to allow us to amend the complaint. And this amended complaint is going to be very strong because every single week El Pais comes out with more and more and more information.

00:32:08:10 – 00:32:25:08

Richard Roth

And if we have to petition the Spanish court to get that directly ourselves, we will. But there’s a lot of evidence already there. There’s a mountain of evidence showing the CIA was intimately involved and, in fact, directed UC Global. So if that’s not enough to hold the CIA accountable, I don’t know what is.

00:32:26:16 – 00:32:26:22

Joe Lauria

Thank you.

00:32:27:03 – 00:32:44:06

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Folks, I just want to let people know that I have put in the chat to everyone our motion in opposition to the CIA’s motion to dismiss.

00:32:44:19 – 00:33:03:14

Richard Roth

Let me say one more thing. Clearly the laws are, it’s very hard to sue the U.S. government. You name the agency, it’s hard. There’s exemptions, there’s immunities. And the CIA has loaded their motion with all those. And it’s an obstacle we’re going to have to overcome. There is a chance that the court says, you know what, You haven’t overcome those obstacles.

00:33:03:14 – 00:33:19:16

Richard Roth

We do believe that from this new information we’ve obtained under Iqbal and other cases, that we believe that the court will deny the [CIA] motion. But it’s you know, the government does make it hard to sue the government. There’s no question about it.

00:33:21:15 – 00:34:02:01

Debra Hrbek

So I could just add one point on that. The issue of the proof about the CIA having turned Morales into an agent as alleged in our complaint, this all happened in early January 2017, when Morales went to a convention for private sessions security firms in Las Vegas. And ah, what seems very clear from the evidence that we’ve seen is that he was bragging about the fact that he had the contract from the government to provide security at the embassy where Julian Assange was then staying and having sanctuary.

00:34:02:01 – 00:34:46:03

Debra Hrbek

And he was turned into an agent then by the security team that was engaged by Las Vegas Sands. Sheldon Adelson was a known close colleague of the then president, Mr. Trump, and the very, very… if you want to go down a good rabbit hole, have a look at a very similar situation that happened in Macao some years ago, around the same time actually, just a couple of years before, and heavily reported in The Guardian, when the Las Vegas Sands was used by the CIA to basically provide cover up for its activities by turning local security agencies into agents of the CIA.

00:34:46:04 – 00:34:55:02

Debra Hrbek

So there’s this, this is their M.O. This is what they do. They don’t sign contracts. They do things covertly.

00:34:55:02 – 00:34:55:20

Margaret Kunstler

So we also had very significant affidavits that were accepted by the extradition court saying that they were whistleblowers. They’re not mentioned [named] because they’re afraid that their names come out, who were working for UC Global, who testified that, in fact, that Morales was bragging about his relationship to the CIA consistently. They also have a number of other connections that they make that is very significant.

00:35:25:11 – 00:35:38:02

Margaret Kunstler

So when we started out with this, we didn’t have this, the evidence that we have now, but we did have the testimony of two people who worked for UC Global who said that Morales was working with the CIA.

00:35:41:20 – 00:35:55:19

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Okay. Thank you very much, Margaret. We have a couple more questions, Tarek. Do you want to go ahead and ask?

00:36:05:13 – 00:36:40:20

Tarek Haddad

Okay. Thanks, Trevor. Thank you all for your presentation today. Yeah. My name is Tarek Haddad. I’m a journalist based in London. I’ve been following the case for the last three years, following the court proceedings as well as the actual spat that was going on in Spain. Debra just alluded to it there. The company Las Vegas Sands. My question is in relation to this, obviously, those of you that are familiar with what’s happened in this case will know that Las Vegas Sands seems to be an integral part of this whole spying operation.

00:36:40:20 – 00:36:51:04

Tarek Haddad

And they’re obviously a US firm, formerly owned by Sheldon Adelson. I just was curious why they’re absent from the litigation.

00:36:59:18 – 00:37:01:13

Tarek Haddad

They’re not mentioned. They’re not defendants.

00:37:09:03 – 00:37:12:03

Debra Hrbek

Our action is in New York and they don’t have a New York presence.

00:37:14:09 – 00:37:42:12

Richard Roth

And quite frankly, I mean, if the location where a deal was struck was Sands, I don’t really care where the location was, what the location is. I care about the people that struck the deal. And that’s what we’re really we’re going after, really that, we’re going to, if you will, to the heart of the matter which is against the individuals and entities that decided to engage in this, for lack of a better word, espionage on their own citizens.

00:37:44:07 – 00:37:48:24

Debra Hrbek

We would have loved to have sued Sheldon Adelson if we’d just been able to.

00:37:51:00 – 00:38:00:10

Trevor Fitzgibbon

OK that’s great. Anna. Anna Brees. I see she has a question for everyone. Does democracy need some secrets?

00:38:05:11 – 00:38:34:23

Anna Brees

Hi everyone. I’m so excited about citizen journalism. Mobile journalism. It’s you know, we all have a voice. We can all make a difference. But I’m so excited about what I’m doing, what I’m doing in terms of enabling it and empowering people with their mobiles. So I, I do have a question to ask in relation to Assange because I was involved in this many years ago, and it was always Russia Today that was looking after Assange and I felt a bit uncomfortable about that.

00:38:34:23 – 00:39:08:10

Anna Brees

I’m completely going back to the ground, hyperlocal and mobilizing and empowering citizen journalists with mobile journalism. You, we’re all, we’ve all got a voice. We all matter. But I’m trying to bring it right back down to the people, hyperlocal, the communities. I don’t know Julian Assange.

00:39:10:20 – 00:39:33:22

Anna Brees

I don’t know him. I’ve written to him in prison and I haven’t had a reply. What I would say is we’re all, we all care about the truth. We all care about that movement. But we’re all with the advent of AI and deep fakes, I’m finding it very difficult to build trust when I don’t know any of you.

00:39:35:16 – 00:40:05:12

Anna Brees

I don’t know any of you. I only know the people I meet. I know the people I meet here immediately. And I also am very passionate about mobile journalism and citizen journalism. So my my concern is how do we organize ourselves? Does democracy have to have some secrets and has Julian Assange, and this is a challenge, is a difficult and painful challenge, has Julian Assange’s destroyed democracy?

00:40:08:18 – 00:40:47:16

Debra Hrbek

I’m going to say no, even if which we can just disagree or agree on whether democracy needs secrets. Julian Assange and WikiLeaks published verified newsworthy information that was amplified by five major international papers of record in five different countries. So I think that if you know whether or not you trust the source, the media, such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, sorry, and The Guardian and Der SPIEGEL, that perhaps you do have more trust of.

00:40:47:16 – 00:41:13:04

Debra Hrbek

They verified and further, you know, they didn’t they wouldn’t have reported his information without making sure that it was accurate. So he’s not in jail for destroying democracy. Julian’s in jail for publishing verified newsworthy information that you only heard about because other mainstream journalists and publications got it out there. So that’s what we’re talking about, is whether he should be in jail for this.

00:41:13:17 – 00:41:21:06

Anna Brees

But how does democracy look when we are allowing secrets to be shared? How is, how does that work?

00:41:21:12 – 00:41:44:07

Richard Roth

You can approach it two different ways. One way to approach it is, how does an investigative reporter draw a line on what they should publish? If an investigative reporter gets some information, gets Donald Trump’s returns, which the New York Times got, should it not publish it because it got it?

00:41:44:07 – 00:41:55:15

Richard Roth

And it shouldn’t have gotten it? And the concern I have is that people like you shouldn’t have that test. You shouldn’t have to say, do I report this? Will I get in trouble with the authorities?

00:41:55:15 – 00:41:56:07

Anna Brees

Absolutely.

00:41:56:07 – 00:42:15:08

Richard Roth

That’s a real risk to the first Amendment in this country. So that’s sort of one way to approach it. You if you get something and you think it’s newsworthy, then you should have a right to publish it. And that’s what makes people nervous that this whole onslaught and Julian Assange puts everybody at risk.

00:42:16:04 – 00:42:41:13

Anna Brees

Where we’re in a really difficult because we have brands, we have brands, big brands, Fox News, BBC, ITV, big brands, and then we have individuals. And you see what’s happening with Tucker Carlson at the moment on Twitter. He has 70 million. He’s totally transforming what’s happening in terms of media and trust. So we have big brands, organizations and we have individuals.

00:42:41:19 – 00:42:45:04

Anna BreesOr do we trust the organization? That’s the question.

00:42:45:13 – 00:43:05:15

Richard Roth

Well, I listen, I do believe democracy does have secrets. I mean, there are secrets in the government, but the press shouldn’t have. If something comes out of a historical event, whether it be a president or any anyone in any country, the press shouldn’t have this A.

00:43:05:17 – 00:43:12:19

Anna Brees

But who’s going to tell the story? Who is going to be the person to reveal this massive story?

00:43:13:04 – 00:43:16:10

Richard Roth

The answer is whoever it goes to on your end. And you shouldn’t be…

00:43:16:10 – 00:43:30:21

Anna Brees

It’s all about who has the most trust to reveal the story. So Assange has power. You have power. We all have power. Who has enough power to tell the story about this big reveal?

00:43:31:23 – 00:43:58:05

Richard Roth

Well, you’re right. Because now we’re blending in this whole fake news element. All these little people are coming out with news stories which are just ridiculous. And so when, as Deb said, five legitimate sources confirm that what he said was accurate and stand by him, and as recently as I think two months ago, I think they were was it seven or eight different international newspapers came out and said, what are we doing with Assange?

00:43:58:19 – 00:44:21:20

Anna Brees

I work for the BBC, I work for ITV. Who cares who comes out with this story? He was going to reveal the story. Is it going to be Tucker Carlson? Is it going to be the BBC? Is it going to be what was it? We had some incredible stories coming out from what was it, Project Veritas? Project Veritas, Who is going to be the story?

00:44:22:05 – 00:44:24:10

Anna Brees

You know, is it Assange? Who is going to reveal.

00:44:25:20 – 00:44:48:04

Trevor Fitzgibbon

I guess I don’t I don’t want to cut you off and I don’t mean to be rude. We only have a few minutes left because of the allotted time for the Zoom. So we need to go to some other people who have questions. Please accept my apology. Okay. I have a question from… Can folks just talk a little bit more about David Morales?

00:44:48:09 – 00:44:57:24

Trevor Fitzgibbon

This is coming from a few journalists. What is the significance of him? Tell us a little bit about him, David Morales and UC Global

00:45:02:23 – 00:45:28:21

Debra Hrbek

Yeah, I mean, he was CEO of UC Global, which was a tiny private security company in Spain before it ended up getting this “gig”. It had literally two very small contracts from the Ecuador government. And and then all of a sudden, it’s his… He was a former Marine, I believe.

00:45:28:21 – 00:45:38:24

Debra Hrbek

I know he was in the military. He’s a sort of a mercenary kind of a guy when he went to the Las Vegas Sands shot convention in 2011.

00:45:38:24 – 00:45:40:20

Trevor Fitzgibbon

That that’s what we want to hear. Yeah.

00:45:40:23 – 00:46:00:03

Debra Hrbek

All of a sudden, his fortunes seemed to change. He started jet setting around. He came to the United States 64 times in the two years subsequent to that, apparently to practice his English when when asked why he had to make so many journeys to the United States from Spain all of a sudden. People noticed he was driving fancy cars.

00:46:00:24 – 00:46:16:12

Debra Hrbek

He all of a sudden got lucrative contracts in Central and South America. So the Ecuador government wasn’t giving him that kind of access. So that’s who he is. He’s a mercenary. The CIA was paying him handsomely for doing this.

00:46:17:04 – 00:46:35:21

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Thank you. Deb, we have a question from William Goodwin. He has a question. He says, What is the hardest [evidence] that has emerged that the CIA was involved in UC Global, what goes beyond circumstantial evidence of the CIA’s role in the case? Is it the files named CIA on Morales’s computers or is there something else?

00:46:37:07 – 00:46:38:01

Richard Roth

So we.

00:46:38:01 – 00:46:38:07

Debra Hrbek

Just.

00:46:39:00 – 00:46:40:03

Richard Roth

Go ahead. Deb, you could start.

00:46:40:18 – 00:47:01:00

Debra Hrbek

Well, we suspect there’s a lot more because these files were just turned over very recently, a week or two ago. So and there’s 210 plus gigabytes of information that were deliberately withheld by the Spanish police. So we suspect in those 210 gigabytes, there’s a lot more. This was something that was discovered that was disturbing.

00:47:01:15 – 00:47:19:10

Richard Roth

Including communications [913 emails). We expect to see communications between UC Global and somebody at the CIA, and so we think there’s a lot there. You don’t have a CIA, I don’t have a CIA file on my desk. I mean, why do you need a CIA file unless you put documents in it? So that’s where we’re going.

00:47:20:07 – 00:47:28:10

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Okay, Stefania, you’ve been waiting patiently. Do you have a question. You need to unmute yourself.

00:47:28:10 – 00:47:35:18

Stefania Maurizi

You hear me now? Yes. So good afternoon. I’m an Italian journalist. I have been working on this case for the last 14 years, on all documents. I have been spied on etc. I want to ask, is there any solid evidence that all data of all of us were basically copied by UC Global?

00:47:55:08 – 00:48:04:05

Stefania Maurizi

I’m asking because my phone was opened too, but I have no evidence that my data were actually copied.

00:48:06:05 – 00:48:07:22

Trevor Fitzgibbon

When you went and met with Assange.

00:48:08:13 – 00:48:09:01

Stefania Maurizi

Yeah.

00:48:09:01 – 00:48:09:21

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Yeah, right.

00:48:13:05 – 00:48:35:15

Debra Hrbek

We suspect we’ll find solid data. I mean, what we do have is photographic evidence of the backs of cell phones being taken off, photographs of the SIM cards, photographs of the IMEI, which is on the inside of the phone. That is a very weird thing for a private security agency to be doing if they’re not actually getting at the data or trying to hack the phone.

00:48:36:09 – 00:48:37:21

Richard Roth

And to add to Margaret’s point earlier, one of the reasons why this case was started is because we had two people who were at UC Global who were very uncomfortable in doing what they were doing. So we have sworn affidavits where they essentially provided a detailed map of what they were doing and why they were doing it, which is what led to this whole lawsuit, because all of a sudden we said, wait a minute, they were in the embassy.

00:49:05:04 – 00:49:08:24

Richard Roth

So, yes, there’s there’s real evidence and we expect there’s a lot more.

00:49:09:24 – 00:49:11:04

Stefania Maurizi

Can I just add one very quick information? My phone was opened at a precise moment, December 2017.

00:49:18:03 – 00:49:23:07

Stefania Maurizi

One month after I had discovered the destruction of key documents by the Crown Prosecution Service, which is the interface of the U.S. Department of Justice in the extradition and after six years, last week the London tribunal now basically issued an order to the Crown Prosecution Service to provide any information on the destruction of the documents. And if they don’t comply, they risk basically contempt proceedings. They have to comply by the 23rd of June. And this happened one month after I discovered this destruction. My phone was unscrewed.

00:50:12:02 – 00:50:31:23

Richard Roth

It’s just, you know, shows you the power. We would not know any of this, but for what’s going on in Spain. I mean, we are learning every day. We’re learning every day. And there are additional hearings, there’s additional productions. And the Spanish lawyers are going through this closely because we would never know any of these facts.

00:50:32:07 – 00:50:42:00

Richard Roth

This would all have been concealed from us. But for the fact that UC Global, the Spanish courts want to know what what the heck went on here.

00:50:46:14 – 00:50:56:22

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Amelia Bootland, I hope I’m pronouncing that way, has a question for folks. What is the timeline in judicial procedure ahead regarding this case?

00:50:58:14 – 00:51:22:23

Richard Roth

So that’s a fair question, that courts, things in the U.S. never go that quickly. There will be reply papers filed by the government. They will probably be filed. They’re due in a month. They may want more time. We will probably have a decision on this motion some time by, I would say the fall, maybe early fall, maybe even late fall, maybe even winter.

00:51:23:16 – 00:51:45:06

Richard Roth

There’s some very serious issues that the court has to address and the court understands the significance of these issues. So once we get a decision by the court, either granting the motion to dismiss, in which case the case is over, or granting the motion to dismiss and letting us re-plead, in which case we’ll file a new complaint or denying the motion to dismiss, we will then start discovery.

00:51:45:06 – 00:51:50:14

Richard Roth

This case will not be going to trial until probably at least a year from now.

00:51:51:06 – 00:52:15:01

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Okay, Shaun Waterman from Newsweek, you have a question? Shawn, are you there? Hello? Hey there, Shawn.

00:52:18:14 – 00:52:37:17

Shaun Waterman

Can you talk about the public statements made by Pompeo in this autobiography and elsewhere since the original complaint was filed and what impact that might have on the case?

00:52:39:14 – 00:53:04:10

Richard Roth

Pompeo’s statement? Deb, you want to talk about that? What’s in the memoir? He wrote a book. You can go to Barnes and Noble and buy it. And he says some very revealing things. I’m not sure if you heard what Deb said earlier about the timeline, but it’s somewhat startling that he was, almost on Christmas Eve, looking into what was it, extrajudicial assassination?

00:53:04:10 – 00:53:26:07

Debra Hrbek

The guidelines on extrajudicial killings, by the CIA. We have guidelines for those, evidently. And he specifically stated that he was looking at those documents. Right? A day after the Ecuador plan to bring Julian to safety was scuttled.

00:53:30:06 – 00:53:38:09

Richard Roth

Other than that, he really has not said a lot. He really does not. And he’s about to announce his run for the presidency. So he’s staying as far away from this as possible.

00:53:39:12 – 00:53:50:24

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Okay. I have another question. Can U.S. complainants ask for financial investigations on UC Global finances? So check where the money came from.

00:54:05:22 – 00:54:29:22

Richard Roth

Yes, the plaintiffs are entitled to discovery. Should the court deny the motion the CIA is a defendant. So we are entitled to discovery from UC Global and the CIA, to look at financial documents to and see what money was exchanged from the CIA to UC Global for its services. We also hope to get them in Spain.

00:54:30:15 – 00:54:47:13

Richard Roth

We hope that those are some of the documents we’re going to see now. Are you going to see a deposit from the CIA? Most likely not. And it’s going to involve a little tracing, but we do believe there were significant payments made to UC Global and Morales by the CIA or on behalf of the CIA.

00:54:50:21 – 00:55:12:03

Trevor Fitzgibbon

I have another question, I think for everybody, especially for Deb and Richard. Can speakers address in more detail what is it in the new filing and that really is going to take the story forward?

00:55:20:16 – 00:55:44:23

Debra Hrbek

We should be clear that the primary purpose of the filing is opposing the motion to dismiss, which is basically making the point that we did allege quite thoroughly in our initial complaint, which was, as Margaret said, based on sworn testimony by UC Global employees, that they were in fact, acting under the orders of the CIA.

00:55:45:03 – 00:56:17:13

Debra Hrbek

This testimony was submitted in connection with the U.K. extradition proceedings. The extradition proceedings in the high court in London for the extradition of Julian Assange. And the U.S. government did not oppose these submissions. So essentially, these these these statements by UC Global employees were essentially accepted by the U.S. government. So the bulk of our motion is to emphasize the fact that we’ve absolutely you can’t be dismissed just based on the complaint.

00:56:17:13 – 00:56:41:14

Debra Hrbek

But as it happened a few days before we filed the motion, we learned all this new stuff that came in out on Sunday from the firm El Pais, where it was clear that there’s mountains of evidence that will further back up our claim, probably provide more physical evidence. We’ll wait and see. And additionally, a couple of weeks ago, there was this great video of this.

00:56:42:07 – 00:56:58:05

Debra Hrbek

It’s in Spanish, but it’s got English subtitles all about this escape this plan to free Julian from the embassy that was scuttled very, very quickly by the U.S. government in December of 2017.

00:56:59:16 – 00:57:02:21

Richard Roth

And if you look also. Go ahead, Margaret.

00:57:03:18 – 00:57:38:12

Margaret Ratner Kunstler

No, I think there was a question earlier about Pompeo and his speech, and I think that outlined exactly what the CIA was attempting to do, and that was to criminalize journalism and a whole, I mean, it was to assert that certain activities as based on publishing various national security matters were criminal. And it makes it possible to criminalize.

00:57:38:12 – 00:58:00:03

Margaret Ratner Kunstler

And I mean, it’s so hard to be a journalist to begin with. Now, any time a journalist wants to publish something revealing something about national security – and the word national security seems to cover everything – now they’re really in a difficult situation. They face prosecution in the United States for talking about anything that is national security, protecting…

00:58:01:14 – 00:58:30:22

Richard Roth

And I would just add to to the question, if you go to pages 33, 34 of the memo we filed today [June 7, 2023], you will see what just Deb just referred to, as some of the new evidence that’s come in. And as Deb said, if you read El Pais, there’s weekly new information coming out about the CIA’s involvement in this, in its surveillance of Julian Assange.

00:58:31:15 – 00:58:35:10

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Okay. And then Tory Says, you have a question.

00:58:47:11 – 00:59:09:21

Tory Says

All right. Fantastic. Great conversation. And thank you for elaborating on Morales, because there’s a lot of people that don’t know. But one thing I wanted to kind of ask is a two part question. We do understand the CIA connection with all of this, of course. And we do know that UC Global has worked with the Analysis Corporation type people, you know, which was John Brennan’s company out in Europe.

00:59:09:21 – 00:59:37:05

Tory Says

Right? Based in Luxembourg. A lot. So have we actually taken a look into Adam Waldman? Because Adam Waldman actually, as you all know, visited Julian Assange and he’s been known to have worked with UC Global as well. So that was kind of a statement question. Have we looked into it? And then the one thing that I get from my audience and anybody can answer this, is what else can we do?

00:59:37:19 – 01:00:01:03

Tory Says

Because as people we acknowledge that, you know, in this day and age, it’s 2023, secrets are pretty much gone, especially with the invention of cyberspace. And we do understand what a merit it was for Julian Assange to shed the light on many governments, on what atrocities are happening and how they’re happening. Now, I know my listeners have been sending letters to Julian Assange.

01:00:01:10 – 01:00:17:04

Tory Says

I have been talking about him being in prison, you know, and I kind of call out journalists that never mention that he’s still there. These people made a lot of money from the information he provided, but none of them are willing to put themselves on the line to help him through the situation. And messing with the CIA is no fun.

01:00:17:14 – 01:00:37:12

Tory Says

And you see it here. No fun. So what can they do? I mean, I’ve tried with a lot of my listeners that are in Latin America to probe the Ecuadorian government to see what quid pro quo happened, to allow things like this to happen. What else can they do? Because protests don’t work. We’ve been writing letters.

01:00:38:01 – 01:00:56:19

Tory Says

You know, we’ve tried to bring to the light where we subpoenaed, well, we asked for an open records request for the pardon that President Trump signed, but was never formally presented. Because if that document exists, then that’s a big deal. And the FBI has hid that from us. So what else can the people do? So those two questions: UC Global, Adam Waldman and that.

01:00:58:17 – 01:01:22:15

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Can I ask Margaret? I mean, Margaret is a legend. She is a human rights, consular rights, civil rights attorney that is legendary. So I definitely want her to answer the second part of that. I don’t know about the guy in the first part, but not to put you on the spot, Margaret, no pressure or anything, but I feel like you’re a good person and you’re a part of that question.

01:01:24:05 – 01:01:51:21

Margaret Ratner Kunstler

Well, it is apparent that there is a lot of fear about coming out in favor of revealing government secrets. Now, this is kind of new. I mean, reporters used to feel that that part of the work that they were doing, was to reveal government secrets, because those are the things that, mostly government secrets, hide crimes.

01:01:52:04 – 01:02:23:22

Margaret Ratner Kunstler

And if you don’t get that information out, then the government can become a lawbreaker. So what has happened is that journalists, I think, have become frightened of talking about the situation with Assange, of talking about the limitations on national security journalism, of talking about whether the mass media is controlled by these speakers who only talk, who are experts and ex-government employees.

01:02:24:01 – 01:02:53:15

Margaret Ratner Kunstler

And who is talking about this? Who is in control of the situation? How do we break through and get more journalists to do, answer, and to do the investigation that is necessary to break this through? I mean, it’s a real question, and it’s a media question. And the issue here is, I mean, yes, it used to be that we could get enough people out on the streets to have an effect publicly.

01:02:54:01 – 01:03:26:24

Margaret Ratner Kunstler

But this is really more serious than that because this is a silencing of the media that is really significant and preventing investigation of the crimes that the governments committed, the crimes that the government committed against Julian Assange. And and Pompeo in his speech specifically made an effort to limit the First Amendment and to criminalize any journalist who talks about national security issues.

01:03:27:06 – 01:03:42:24

Margaret Ratner Kunstler

And that’s really frightening. And I think that that’s the issue here, is that we have to get the journalists involved because they’re the ones who are in danger. And understandably, they’re afraid of saying anything and doing the work that they should be doing.

01:03:51:04 – 01:03:54:04

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Okay. Tory, does that kinda answer your question?

01:03:55:05 – 01:04:12:21

Tory Says

Well, yeah, it kind of does. But, you know, like, I do it all the time, obviously, and I get canceled. I just come back and again and again. But I think it’s time we put more pressure on to these journalists. I call them out. I tell them, you’ve made so much money with what he has given you, you are able to see the atrocities.

01:04:12:21 – 01:04:36:03

Tory Says

Why aren’t you pushing harder? Why aren’t you going back to the beginning? If we all start at 2016, as journalists, we would be able to provide more, you know, and that’s the thing. Marches, letters, like, you know, maybe on the 31st of August we can organize a whole U.S. march. I know there’s a lot of people that would come out for that, for him.

01:04:36:11 – 01:04:46:01

Tory Says

And it’s really important we have transparency. And I understand. Yes, secrets are to conceal crimes, but in this digital age, it’s hidden. So thank you, Margaret.

01:04:46:12 – 01:04:48:18

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Ben I think you were about to chime in there.

01:04:49:02 – 01:05:16:18

Ben Cohen

I was attempting to chime in. Tory, you know, if you’ve got people that are following you, that are looking to do more to help Julian. And if they go to AssangeDefense.org and click on the button at the top that says “Take action”, there’s a place to put in your email address. There are actions that occur on a regular basis.

01:05:17:24 – 01:05:30:21

Ben Cohen

The next one coming up is a coordinated banner drop in about 50 locations around the country to try to get the mainstream media to notice.

01:05:32:04 – 01:05:35:04

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Okay. I have a quick question. One more question from…

01:05:35:13 – 01:05:37:06

Tory Says

Can I say something on that Trevor?

01:05:37:13 – 01:05:39:16

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Okay. Go ahead.

01:05:40:11 – 01:05:53:10

Tory Says

I’d like to coordinate with you on that because when we had issues before, we dropped billboards all over the United States. Maybe we can coordinate in synchrony globally to do this. I agree. Thank you.

01:05:54:00 – 01:05:54:22

Ben Cohen

Yeah, absolutely.

01:05:56:01 – 01:06:14:12

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Okay. We have another quick question. Can U.S. complainants ask the U.S. investigators to question some of the government sources, which talked to Yahoo! News about CIA assassination plans against Julian Assange and to ask about UC Global?

01:06:16:18 – 01:06:37:01

Richard Roth

Well, let me hit that one. Understand that we’re in the U.S. where it is civil litigation. So there’s no U.S. investigators. This is not, we don’t have the FBI. We don’t have the U.S. attorney’s office involved. It is a litigation between between litigants, civil litigants. So we could conduct our own discovery and try to find out from Yahoo! who they learned it from, but I don’t think Yahoo! is going to tell us. And that really is not the focus of this lawsuit. This lawsuit – certainly the byproduct of bringing attention to what’s going on with with effective journalism – but the focus of this lawsuit is just not to allow the government to trounce over its citizens by, without a search warrant, just looking at everything they have.

01:07:01:23 – 01:07:30:21

Richard Roth

So, but this lawsuit, again, there aren’t investigators. We don’t have regulators. We don’t have any kind of FBI, or any kind of authority here. But it may be something that is worth looking into. Certainly, if the government did, as Yahoo! reports, attempt or even considered assassinating someone for reporting, that’s something that the government may want to look at.

01:07:30:21 – 01:07:32:09

Richard Roth

We’re not. That’s not what we’re looking at.

01:07:33:00 – 01:07:48:22

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Okay. And, Richard, you know, with your your hundreds of years of experience, I know you can’t totally tell, but if you had to guess on a timeline, how soon before you think we’ll hear back from the judge? You think this will be quicker?

01:07:48:22 – 01:08:06:06

Richard Roth

So I’m not a betting person, but I would give the over under to be some time by the end of September or early October, I’d say before Halloween and after Labor Day. So it’ll be, the court’s going to have to spend some time on this.

01:08:06:18 – 01:08:20:02

Trevor Fitzgibbon

Okay. And then, Cathy Vogan [from Consortium News], you’ve been so patient and you’ve been helping to host this thing. You have a question. You, and then we’re going to I think we’re going to need to close it up, folks. But, Cathy, why don’t we make you the final question.

01:08:22:13 – 01:08:26:09

Richard Roth

You’re muted. You muted, Kathy, you’re muted.

01:08:29:13 – 01:09:02:18

Cathy Vogan

I’m somebody who really likes the nitty gritty. And what we have in the El Pais article that has just come out is one screenshot, but there are mentions of other folders such as “Ladies toilet”. Now, I’m not trying to be funny, but that’s where Julian Assange went with his lawyers to conduct legally privileged conversations.

01:09:03:13 – 01:09:06:16

Cathy Vogan

What we see in this screenshot, however, you can just look at the thread. And of course CIA is one of the folders and then you have embassy and then you have people’s names.

01:09:17:12 – 01:09:19:17

Cathy Vogan

So my question.

01:09:19:17 – 01:09:26:16

Cathy Vogan

Is it possible to get a little bit more of that, especially [contents of the folder] “Ladies toilet”?

01:09:26:23 – 01:09:28:23

Cathy Vogan

In the hope that some of your names are going to come up? Would that help you in your case or is it too late now to put anything more in with Judge Koetl.

01:09:41:06 – 01:10:00:07

Richard Roth

That will help us. We have to get over this legal hurdle, which is the motion to dismiss. But yes, that is information, which is, if you will, phase two of any trial. You have your pleadings and motions of any case, You have your pleadings in motions, you have discovery. Then you have your trial in the discovery phase. Phase two, that’s the stuff we want to know.

01:10:00:07 – 01:10:28:20

Richard Roth

We want to know. There are there have been allegations in both in El Pais and I believe even the affidavits that there were microphones in the ladies bathroom which overheard Julian Assange conversations. If the CIA was doing that, that is outrageous. So that is stuff that we do want to learn during the discovery phase. And we were very fortunate in one way because a lot of the information we want, we believe, has been obtained in Spain.

01:10:29:04 – 01:10:43:14

Richard Roth

So our goal is to is to get that information. Listen, the press reporting is pretty startling. But you’re right, Cathy, getting that actual evidence is going to be very revealing. And that’s our goal. Yes.

01:10:44:01 – 01:11:06:18

Cathy Vogan

But surely if you had something like that – I mean, that’s what a lot of these questions have been about – wouldn’t that information, that evidence, be a lot more compelling to persuade Judge Koetl to say, yes, this should not be dismissed?

01:11:07:09 – 01:11:37:19

Richard Roth

It absolutely would. But the CIA does things discreetly. The CIA does not broadcast. It’s private. So we have to dig. We have to dig. We have to dig deep and what we’ve learned thus far from these affidavits, from what El Pais has said, and just the filings in Spain have given us, really encouraged us. They’ve encouraged us that there’s a lot more out there and we’re going to keep digging until we get it done.

01:11:37:19 – 01:12:03:13

Trevor Fitzgibbon

I think it’s a great way to wrap up the press conference. I want to thank everybody for joining. I do want to let journalists know, please email me at [email protected] if you’d like a copy of the press release. My phone number is area code 7247750487, in case anybody would like to interview any of our panelists. Ben Cohen, thank you for joining us. Deb, Richard, Margaret, you guys are the best. And I want to give a special shout out to Consortium News, Joe and Cathy for hosting. And thank you all for for joining us. Take care.

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