This is a little over the top, no?

Novak Djokovic has been expelled from Australia after an Australian federal court panel unanimously upheld the deportation order issued on him by the Australian immigration minister, Alexander Hawke, thus dashing his hopes of playing in the Australian Open that starts today.

I can understand his family and fans and his Serbian compatriots being upset. But the reaction has been way over the top, with the Serbian government also piling on.

[Serbian president, Aleksandar Vučić] said he was sure Djokovic “would have been treated differently if he hadn’t come from Serbia … If he was from another country, the approach would be completely different. Of course people here are frustrated, 90% are on Novak’s side.”

The player’s father, Srđan, said the episode amounted to “an attempted assassination with 50 bullets to the chest”, while the sports minister, Vanja Udovičić, described it as “nonsense and shame, absurdity and hypocrisy”.
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The full sordid web of Jeffrey Epstein is still to be revealed

Branko Marcetic writes that while the trial of Ghislaine Maxwell did not blow the lid off the whole sordid Epstein saga due to the prosecutors being cautious in their efforts to secure a conviction, the process did produce quite a lot of information that did not get much media attention, that showed the web of high profile people who were part of his circle and traveled around with him. He concludes:

The Jeffrey Epstein saga is the story of the world’s most prolific child sex trafficker who operated more or less unhidden for decades, but was able to consistently escape media scrutiny, legal punishment, and, finally, justice by dying before he went to trial. In a normal world, this tale of sprawling criminality and public corruption would be the subject of an intense, wide-ranging government investigation that would expose the conspiracy’s full scope and the identities of those involved.

Instead, information about the case continues to come in dribs and drabs, thanks only to the work of a few dogged reporters and the occasional fortuitous legal disclosure, limited in this most recent trial by the judge’s order to avoid “needless” naming of names, and prosecutors’ decision to leave tens of thousands of photos seized from Epstein’s home by the FBI unreleased. The public may end up having to wait for the civil suit against Prince Andrew or for Maxwell herself to strike some kind of deal to learn more.

Just as with the John F. Kennedy assassination, obscuring the full truth of the crime has only fed the growth of disreputable nonsense like QAnon, which serves to launder and distract from the intimate involvement of elites like Trump in Epstein’s crimes, turning them into yet another culture war sideshow. This is the double tragedy of Epstein’s death: it’s denied many of his survivors full justice, and turned the terrible truth of his crimes into a shield for his fellow perpetrators.

Marcetic thinks that the Prince Andrew case, if it ever goes to trial, may reveal more details.

Child abuse at an evangelical summer camp

The sexual abuse of minors is an extremely ugly thing that rightly arouses great anger among people. This is likely one reason why the QAnon movement has latched on to that topic to recruit followers, by claiming that there is a vast pedophile ring operating at the highest levels of government and celebrity culture. Once they are hooked, they can be drawn iton the vastly bigger conspiracy theory. But curiously, they do not target institutions that have well-documented cases of rampant pedophilia, such as the Catholic church and the Boy Scouts, probably because they are not considered part of the ‘elites’ and thus do not fit into the broader narrative that QAnon seeks to promote.

Now David French and Nancy French have a very disturbing article in the conservative Christian publication The Dispatch that discusses in graphic detail the sexual abuse of children that took place over many years in an evangelical Christian summer camp known as Kanakuk, where the people in charge of the camp did little to stop it despite being alerted to the problem by some parents. The article says that although the main perpetrator Pete Newman was sent to prison ten years ago, the people in charge then, especially Joe White, are still in charge.
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Prince Andrew’s problems get worse, much worse

A federal judge in New York has said that the civil lawsuit brought by Virginia Giuffre against Prince Andrew can go forward, rejecting his lawyer’s claim that an agreement that was reached between Giuffre and deceased pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, Andrew’s friend, shielded him from such lawsuits. The judge said it was too early in the process to make such judgments.

[Manhattan federal judge Lewis Kaplan] continued: “In a similar vein and for similar reasons, it is not open to the court now to decide, as a matter of fact, just what the parties to the release in the 2009 settlement agreement signed by Ms Giuffre and Jeffrey Epstein actually meant.

“The court’s job at this juncture is simply to determine whether there are two or more reasonable interpretations of that document. If there are, the determination of the ‘right’ or controlling interpretation must await further proceedings.”

“With limited exceptions, the motion must be decided solely on the basis of the allegations of the complaint without regard to any extraneous claims or materials,” Kaplan also wrote. “The 2009 agreement neither appears in nor is referred to” in Giuffre’s civil complaint.
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Tennis star Novak Djokovic in limbo in Australia

Tennis star Novak Djokovic has said that he is opposed to vaccinations. Australia now requires people entering the country to be vaccinated or apply for a special exemption. Djokovic had applied for and got an exemption from the Australian tennis body that issues such exemptions so that he could play in the Australian Open that takes place starting on January 17th. But later it turned out that he had applied for a visa that does not allow for medical exemptions. This caused a furore with people complaining that he was being given special treatment.

Australian prime minister Scott Morrison then stepped in and said only the federal government has the authority to decide who is allowed into the country and under what circumstances and that he was not eligible to enter. The Victorian state government also refused to weigh in in support of Djokovic’s exemption. Meanwhile, Djokovic and his entourage had already departed for Australia on a long flight and upon arrival he was separated from the rest and held isolated under an armed guard at the Melbourne airport while his case was deliberated. In the end, his visa was cancelled and he was asked to leave.
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Elizabeth Holmes found guilty of fraud

After a 15-week trial, a jury today found the founder of the Theranos company guilty on four of the 11 counts of fraud with which she was charged. In an earlier post I discussed how she had persuaded gullible wealthy people like Rupert Murdoch, George Schultz, and henry Kissinger that she had the makings of being the next Steve Jobs, an image that she carefully cultivated and a comparison that she encouraged by her dress and speech. She was found guilty on four of the 11 charges.

A jury convicted Holmes, who was CEO throughout the company’s turbulent 15-year history, on two counts of wire fraud and two counts of conspiracy to commit fraud after seven days of deliberation. The 37-year-old was acquitted on four other counts of fraud and conspiracy that alleged she deceived patients who paid for Theranos blood tests, too.
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The jury deadlocked on three remaining charges, which a federal judge anticipates dismissing as part of a mistrial ruling that could come as early as next week. The split verdicts are “a mixed bag for the prosecution, but it’s a loss for Elizabeth Holmes because she is going away to prison for at least a few years,” said David Ring, a lawyer who has followed the case closely.

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Who said that there is no honor among thieves?

As part of the legal proceeding involving Virginia Giuffre’s charge that Prince Andrew was one of Jeffrey Epstein’s friends that she was pressured to have sex with as a minor, a federal judge yesterday released the sealed agreement that was reached about a decade ago between Epstein and Giuffre in settlement of her case against him.

The unsealed settlement states that upon receipt of the stipulated sum, Giuffre, referred to under her maiden name, agrees to “remise, release, acquit, satisfy and forever discharge the said second parties and any other person or entity who could have been included as a potential defendant … from all, and all manner of, action and actions of Virginia Roberts, including state or federal, cause and causes of action”.

It looks like Epstein was taking care of his friends to insulate them from legal actions by those they abused. Of course, I doubt that he did this purely out of a sense of friendship. More likely it was to prevent them from buckling under the threat of prosecution and revealing damaging information about him.

It is interesting that Andrew and Alan Dershowitz, neither of whom is specifically named, wanted this agreement to be released since they seem to feel that it will take the heat off them.
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Focus shifts to Prince Andrew sexual abuse case

Now that Ghislaine Maxwell has been convicted in the Jeffrey Epstein sexual abuse saga, the next case to follow will be that brought by one of the victims Virginia Giuffre against Prince Andrew. On Saturday, a federal judge blocked an effort by his lawyers to say that he did not have to turn over documents pertaining to the case since Giuffre did not have US jurisdiction. The judge rejected that claim.

Judge Lewis A Kaplan, in a written order, told the prince’s lawyers they must turn over documents on the schedule that has been set in the lawsuit brought by Guiffre who claims she was abused – aged 17 – by the prince on multiple occasions in 2001 while she was being sexually abused by financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Kaplan also rejected arguments by the prince’s lawyer, Andrew Brettler, on jurisdiction grounds after they argued last week that the lawsuit should be dismissed because Giuffre, a US citizen, no longer lives in the US. Brettler has called the lawsuit “baseless”.

The prince’s lawyers claimed evidence was so strong that Giuffre does not reside in the US that it was pointless to exchange evidence until that question is resolved because it could result in the lawsuit’s dismissal.

They argued that Giuffre has lived in Australia for all but two of the past 19 years, has an Australian driver’s licence and lives in a $1.9m (£1.4m) home in Perth, Western Australia, where she and her husband, an Australian national, live with their three children.
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Ghislaine Maxwell found guilty of sex trafficking

A jury unanimously convicted Jeffrey Epstein’s close associate of all but one count. She faces up to 65 years in prison but a sentencing date has not yet been set.

Maxwell was convicted on five of the six charges she faced. In addition to sex-trafficking, Maxwell was found guilty of conspiracy to entice individuals under the age of 17 to travel in interstate commerce with intent to engage in illegal sexual activity, conspiracy to transport individuals under the age of 17 to travel in interstate commerce with intent to engage in illegal sexual activity; transportation of an individual under the age of 17 with intent to engage in illegal sexual activity; and conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of individuals under the age of 18.

Maxwell was found not guilty of one count: enticement of an individual under the age of 17 to travel with intent to engage in illegal sexual activity. Jurors reached their verdict after 40 hours of deliberations over the course of six days.
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The verdict marks a dramatic conclusion to an unexpectedly fast-moving trial: proceedings were originally expected to take at least six weeks. Prosecutors called 24 witnesses over 10 days, and defense attorneys called nine witnesses over two days.

Prosecutors said that Maxwell “preyed on vulnerable young girls, manipulated them and served them up to be sexually abused” by Epstein. There were four accusers in this case: Jane, Kate and Carolyn, who did not use their full names, and Annie Farmer.
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The verdict means jurors agreed that Maxwell had conspired to lure, and shuttle, girls for illicit sexual activity – and that she had conspired to sex-traffick them. They agreed that Maxwell transported Jane for illegal sexual activity. The sex-trafficking count related specifically to Carolyn.

This article traces Maxwell’s life and her rise and fall.

I still do not understand why she did not flee to France when she had the chance. She must have known that she was being targeted for legal action, especially after Epstein killed himself in prison. Since she has French citizenship as well, it would not have been possible to extradite her to the US to face trial, since France does not allow its citizens to be extradited.

The desperate defenses of the January 6th rioters

As I wrote before, so many of the January 6th rioters gleefully posted vivid accounts of what they did on that day on social media that they pretty much eliminated any reasonable legal defense that could be mounted in court. The only option left was to throw themselves at the mercy of the courts, using permutations of “I am really sorry”, “I was stupid”, and “I was misled by Trump and others”. That defense is getting mixed results.
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