Julian Assange, the creator of WikiLeaks, is preparing to return to Australia and admit to a single charge of conspiring and disclosing classified information. The plea agreement, which has not yet been approved by the court, represents a significant development in the lengthy legal battle between the Australian activist and the U.S. government.
According to Reuters, court filings in the U.S. District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands indicate that Assange could face a 62-month sentence, although it is unlikely that he will serve additional time, as he has already spent an equivalent period at Belmarsh Prison in the U.K. WikiLeaks confirmed on Jun. 25 that Assange “left Belmarsh maximum security prison” after spending over 1,900 days there.
Founded in 2010, WikiLeaks gained attention for releasing hundreds of thousands of classified U.S. military documents related to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. In 2017, the organization published documents revealing how Russia uses state surveillance to spy on internet and cellphone users.
The plea agreement comes after former CIA software engineer Joshua Adam Schulte was convicted in February and sentenced to 480 months for espionage, computer hacking, contempt of court, making false statements to the FBI, and child pornography. Schulte’s crimes included leaking the largest cache of classified data to WikiLeaks.
The journey of WikiLeaks intersects with the world of cryptocurrency, particularly Bitcoin. At one point, Assange attempted to raise funds in BTC after VISA, MasterCard, PayPal, Amazon, and other financial companies began denying payments to WikiLeaks.
During a 2014 Reddit Ask Me Anything (AMA) session, Assange recounted Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto’s opposition to WikiLeaks using the nascent crypto in 2010. At the time, Nakamoto expressed concern that association with WikiLeaks could overwhelm Bitcoin in its infancy. A few days later, before mysteriously disappearing, Nakamoto emphasized his stance on the potential fallout from the WikiLeaks-cryptocurrency association, stating, “WikiLeaks has kicked the hornet’s nest, and the swarm is headed towards us.” Despite this, Assange still invested in Bitcoin, reportedly making a 50,000% return. The current extent of his Bitcoin holdings remains unclear.
In one way or another, the crypto community found a way to connect cryptocurrency to Assange’s story. Following a 2021 U.K. High Court ruling allowing Assange’s extradition, his supporters formed a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) called AssangeDAO to advocate for his release. The campaign raised over 17,400 ETH, with contributions from notable crypto figures like Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin.
However, AssangeDAO later faced scrutiny over transparency issues, as blockchain analytics firm SlowMist identified suspicious transaction patterns suggestive of a “soft rug pull.”
Read more: Who will be the next DAO miracle after AssangeDAO?