This is now a prime example in what happens when politics gets involved with justice. The police interviewed everyone involved, including Assange. The district chief prosecutor looked at it and concluded to drop it. Almost a month later, even through there had been no new information available, the political assigned director of Public Prosecution decided to reopen the case and immediately issues a international arrest warrant for Assange who by then had left the country. Assange then later goes into political refugee, while prosecutor refuses to continue with the case for political reasons, which then created a deadlock. A Swedish judge then order the prosecutor to continue with the case, but by then its too late to start diplomatic negotiations to get into the embassy and the case falls through to the statue of limitations.
If the choice had been between the possibility of incompetent police and prosecutor that might cause a criminal go free, or the political mess above, I rather go with the first option. The accused, the potential victims, and the tax payers has all been suffering from this case and the only beneficiary aspect has been the diplomatic relation between Sweden and US. That outcome should be a clear sign that justice and politics do not belong together.
I completely agree with your point in the specific case, but completely disagree in general.
Justice IS political. Justices either run for office as political public figures or are appointed by political public figures. The justice system is an attempt to apply a subset of morality for the betterment of society, which is ultimately a subjective political exercise.
> Justices either run for office as political public figures or are appointed by political public figures
Mon dieu, Baron de Montesquieu must be spinning in his grave! :)
One of the key principles of modern government is (or rather, should be) total independence of the judicial system from political pressure. In practice this is hard to achieve. In the US it turned into a "parallel democracy" with elected judges, who might not answer to regular politicians but are politicians themselves; in Europe it's usually a fundamentally-administrative career path, however in various countries it's more or less influenced by political winds (after all, an efficient Government or Parliament will want someone to actually enforce laws that get passed). Still, there is a clear ideal of purity and independence that original constituents were striving for (usually as a reaction to the arbitrary power of kings and popes), and our failings in reaching it now does not mean we will never reach it.
On your more general point, rather than "justice" I'd rather refer to "law enforcement". Yes, law enforcement is political: it enforces laws written by ruling interests to perpetuate such interests (be those moral, economic, of class or whatever). The degree and intensity of enforcement for any given rule is eminently political. However, "justice" itself is not necessarily the same thing.
At the end of the day, man is not perfect; a system will always be required to address this problem and its consequences. The existence of such a system is not just political but essential to society itself. Pre-political forms of society, where the tribe leader ruled uncontested by virtue of pure physical strength, likely still involved the administration of justice to a certain degree. In a way, the emergence of political structures themselves is an answer to the problem of obtaining justice (who defines what is just? How does he define it? How does he enforce it? and so on).
I don't disagree with your premise, but I can't think of any place outside of the US were judges are running for office and elected. In most places, they are more akin to some sort of civil servant, from an administration independent of the executive and legislative branch.
If the choice had been between the possibility of incompetent police and prosecutor that might cause a criminal go free, or the political mess above, I rather go with the first option. The accused, the potential victims, and the tax payers has all been suffering from this case and the only beneficiary aspect has been the diplomatic relation between Sweden and US. That outcome should be a clear sign that justice and politics do not belong together.