Wikileaks Assange Finally Gets Arrested

                          

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was arrested Thursday at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London after Ecuador withdrew its offer of asylum, according to the Metropolitan Police, who later confirmed that his arrest was under a U.S. extradition warrant.

Details: The Justice Department charged Assange with "a federal charge of conspiracy to commit computer intrusion for agreeing to break a password to a classified U.S. government computer," per its press release announcing the indictment. The charge, which carries a maximum sentence of five years, alleges that Assange conspired with Chelsea Manning in 2010 to crack a password on Defense Department computers. 

Our thought bubble, via Axios' Joe Uchill: What's interesting is that the charges focus on Assange technically assisting Manning's hacking, making the charges more about Assange the hacker than Assange the journalist. It quashes some of the concerns about this being a crackdown on the free press.

The big picture: Assange had been in the embassy since 2012 after being released on bail in the U.K. over sexual assault allegations in Sweden. He claimed that he could be extradited to the U.S. to face prosecution for his work with WikiLeaks if he returned to Sweden to face those charges. Last year, a mistakenly redacted Justice Department filing showed that federal prosecutors had prepped an indictment against him.

By Axios