Investigation into prof's call for Assange's assassination dropped

The Calgary police investigation over a University of Calgary professor's call for the political assassination of Wikileaks editor-in-chief Julian Assange has concluded.

No criminal charges will be made over the comments made by political scientist Tom Flanagan. The former senior advisor to Prime Minister Stephen Harper called for the assassination of WikiLeaks's Assange on the November 30, 2010, broadcast of Power and Politics with Evan Solomon.

"I think Assange should be assassinated, actually. I think Obama should put out a contract and maybe use a drone or something," said Flanagan on the national CBC broadcast.

When Solomon pushed the high profile political scientist on it — "Tom, that's pretty harsh stuff" — Flanagan replied, "Well, I'm feeling very manly today."

The comments quickly appeared in stories by media outlets across Canada and around the world including the Telegraph in the U.K., the Jerusalem Post and National Public Radio in the United States, among others.

Following the media flurry surrounding Flanagan’s remarks, the Calgary Police Service launched an investigation into whether or not Flanagan broke any laws when he suggested that Assange be killed.

“Due to a number of calls we have received from the public regarding this matter, the Calgary Police Service will be gathering all the facts and compiling a package that will be forwarded to the Crown prosecutors office for review," said Calgary police superintendent Kevan Stuart, in a statement released on Dec. 6.

Stuart now says the investigation is closed.

“The comments and the video from the CBC TV coverage were carefully examined from a legal point of view and it was determined that criminal code charges would not be laid, and we closed the file.”

The police investigation was completed a few months ago, but the decision has been unreported until now.

Flanagan declined to comment for this story.

The professor publicly apologized for the remarks shortly afterwards, stating, “I never seriously intended to advocate or propose the assassination of Mr. Assange, but I do think that what he's doing is very malicious.”

"I regret that I made a glib comment about a serious issue."

The U of C professor’s intial remarks struck a chord with students, alumni and citizens in Calgary. Several Facebook groups and websites were created, including a “Fire Tom Flanagan Now!” website and a Facebook group titled “Investigate Tom Flanagan for inciting murder against Julian Assange,” which has over 2,000 likes.

Grady Semmens, associate director of media relations at the university, says the institution received a lot of feedback from students, staff, alumni and the general public following Flanagan’s remarks.

“We’ve had hundreds of people sending in emails and comments and voicing concern over the matter, and we appreciate that,” says Semmens. “Certainly I think that it’s appropriate for people to share those concerns because they made it known that they felt that what he said wasn’t acceptable, and I think he recognized that in the end too.”

After hearing Flanagan’s remarks, Kris Kotarski, a University of Calgary alumnus and a Calgary Herald columnist, spearheaded a letter addressed to Elizabeth Cannon, the university's president. The letter was signed by dozens of alumni, students, and professors, as well as students outside of the U of C.

Kotarski says the group was upset about the impact of Flanagan’s remarks on the reputation of the university, as well as the reputation of Canada.

“It’s quite frightening when someone who is a former senior advisor to the sitting prime minister of Canada goes out on national television and makes comments about political assassination."

The letter stated: “Better than most, a professor of political science should understand that academic freedom is not possible without political freedom, and that political freedom cannot survive in a climate where journalists and opponents of a ruling regime hear public intellectuals advocate for their assassination on the nightly news.”

Kotarski says the letter was sent to the university three times but no reply was ever received.

“It sends a very clear message to me about what I count for as an alumni at the University of Calgary,” says Kotarski, who received a masters degree from the university's Centre for Military and Strategic Studies.

Semmens says the university made “quite an effort” to try and respond to every single email, letter and phone call that came in, with a response that recognized and thanked citizens for taking the time to share their concerns.

“If some people didn’t receive a response or feel that the response was inadequate, then that’s certainly concerning to us,” says Semmens, noting not everybody agreed with the school’s response.

Semmens says he is not able to comment on disciplinary action against Flanagan because cases related to both students and staff are confidential.