Free at long last: Yesterday, news broke that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange would be released from Belmarsh Prison, the maximum security facility he's been kept at in the U.K. for the last five years, and would be free to go home.
Assange, who has been at risk of being extradited to the U.S. and prosecuted under the Espionage Act for publishing documents—an activity protected by the First Amendment—that the government says contain classified national security information, will plead guilty to a single felony count and return to his native Australia. Prior to reaching this deal with the U.S. Department of Justice, Assange could have faced up to 170 years in prison if extradited to America.
