Exactly. Anyone who examines what is public information should be able to see this plain as day. They went through the motions to try to make it look legit, even fabricating evidence, setting up targets with false leads so they could later claim it as justification. They were scheming the entire time.
Guilty as sin with several thousand copies that he made and distributed, Asimov should have never gotten less than 20 years.
Down the memory hole again ...