Over 100,000 people demand that Peter Sunde, former spokesperson of The Pirate Bay, be pardoned from his sham verdict by the Swedish Administration.

In a petition started by Adrian Braekke and managed by Avaaz, 113,338 people signed the demand to grant Peter Sunde pardon, after reading his hair-raising story of corruption and a national system defending itself against at any price against upstart challenges. In late summer, the petition was presented to the Swedish Minister of Justice, Beatrice Ask.

“It’s important that Peter’s struggle is known to the world,” says Adrian Braekke, starter of the petition. “The Pirate Bay trial was a political trial with many irregularities. Sunde was sacrificed to please the copyright industry and his conviction was unjust. I started the petition because he deserves some kind of redress for what he has endured.”

The Swedish Pirate Party has followed the Pirate Bay trial closely as has also leant its support to Braekke’s petition to pardon Peter Sunde.

“Laws need public support to work effectively, and the laws criminalising the free sharing of culture don’t have that public support,” says Anna Troberg, party leader of the Swedish Pirate Party. “More than two million Swedish citizens share files on a regular basis and a substantial part of the Swedish people doesn’t consider this a crime. The petition that Braekke started in support of Sunde is yet further proof of this. It’s time for the government to rethink its approach.”

The Swedish Administration has not commented further on the petition.