US Attorney Chided Swartz On Day of Suicide 656
theodp writes "The e-mail that Defendant Swartz's supplemental memorandum (pdf) cites as paramount to his fifth motion to suppress [evidence against him] is relevant, but not nearly as important as he tries to make it out to be,' quipped United States Attorney Carmen M. Ortiz (pdf) in a court filing made on the same day Aaron Swartz committed suicide. In the 1-7-2011 e-mail Ortiz refers to, which was not produced for Swartz until Dec. 14th — almost two years after his 1-6-2011 arrest — a Secret Service agent reported to the Assistant U.S. Attorney that he was 'prepared to take custody anytime' of Swartz's laptop, although no one had yet sought a warrant to search the computer. In Prosecutor as Bully, Larry Lessig laments, 'They [JSTOR] declined to pursue their own action against Aaron, and they asked the government to drop its. MIT, to its great shame, was not as clear, and so the prosecutor had the excuse he needed to continue his war against the "criminal" who we who loved him knew as Aaron.' Swartz's family also had harsh words for MIT and prosecutors: 'Decisions made by officials in the Massachusetts U.S. Attorney's office and at MIT contributed to his death. The US Attorney's office pursued an exceptionally harsh array of charges, carrying potentially over 30 years in prison, to punish an alleged crime that had no victims. Meanwhile, unlike JSTOR, MIT refused to stand up for Aaron.' With MIT President Emeritus Charles M. Vest currently serving as a Trustee of JSTOR parent Ithaka as well as a Trustee of The MIT Corporation, one might have expected MIT to issue a statement similar to the let's-put-this-behind-us one JSTOR made on the Swartz case back in 2011."
terrorism (Score:3, Insightful)
the US seems to have terrorized a youth into killing himself.
I'd seek gitmo for the US 'official' who performed this act of terrorism.
if we don't stop the american terrorists (gov hacks who can ruin lives at-will for essentially no good reason at all) then we all have BECOME part of them.
a message needs to be sent. TO THE GOVERNMENT. stop being asshats wrapped in the false flag of 'justice'.
Re:terrorism (Score:5, Interesting)
Typical american. You'd fight to have Guantanamo closed and I'm sure you criticize him for keeping the place open -- yet when it comes to someone you don't like, you have no problem condemning them to torture, physical and otherwise. You're no better than the attorney himself.
If you want to stop something like this from happening again you need to take a good, long look in the mirror as a country. You're all guilty, guilty of negligence by putting these people into power and then sitting on your thumbs when they commit atrocities like this. Flail your arms and point fingers all you want but you are ALL TO BLAME.
Re:terrorism (Score:5, Insightful)
You may have missed a nuance or two. First, there's the irony of sending a U.S. AG to Gitmo for doing worse than the people in Gitmo currently did.
Second, the quickest way to get Gitmo closed forever is to make U.S. officials 'eligible' for a stay there.
Re:terrorism (Score:5, Insightful)
the US seems to have terrorized a youth into killing himself.
I've highlighted the operative word. While it's reasonable to assume that they probably didn't help (to put it extremely mildly), even those closest to him will spend years agonizing over what exactly was going through his mind and what, if anything, they could have done to prevent this. Why does everyone else seem to think they've got to the bottom of it in five minutes?
Re: (Score:3)
He broke into the MIT wring closet, installed his own computer, programed his computer to download files at a rate sometimes 100x the normal load for every legitimate user at MIT, hid his face from security cameras, and generally gave off every indication that he fully understood what he did was wrong/illegal, yet continued. Plain and simple, you don't have to work in the Ethics department to understand he comitted crimes.
Maybe, if anything, the letter that "chided" the defendant's FIFTH attempt to supress
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"Plain and simple, you don't have to work in the Ethics department to understand he comitted crimes."
Fuck no he didn't. He showed the real hacker spirit of MIT.
I'm pretty sure you don't know what the fuck I'm talking about, so I suggest you read Stephen Levy's Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution and learn for yourself.
Re: (Score:3)
"Plain and simple, you don't have to work in the Ethics department to understand he comitted crimes." Fuck no he didn't.
Perhaps GP should have said you don't have to work in the Law department, because, yes, he did commit crimes*. That's why he was arrested and charged and would, most likely, have been found guilty.
I'm pretty sure you don't know what the fuck I'm talking about, so I suggest you read Stephen Levy's Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution and learn for yourself.
Why? Does that book point to the statute that makes what he did not a crime?
*if he was still alive I'd probably have to add "alledgedly," since he was never convicted.
Re: (Score:3)
I'm sorry, are you new to Slashdot?
Typically you're lucky if commenters even read the entire clip provided at the top of the story, let alone the linked-to article. ANd additional/background research to form an opinon, that's nearly unheard of here! ;^)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Typical US mentality: law above justice. Procedure over compassion. More important to convict than to convict the right one.
Re:terrorism (Score:5, Insightful)
Agreed. That attitude is all too common in the US. No empathy. Just hang everyone who may have a different sense of right and wrong from you. And definitely don't feel at all bad about all the cruelty and death. Instead, rejoice in it. For great justice! At least until something like this happens to someone they know personally and care about. It reminds me of all the people who have no problem with the TSA strip searching and sexual violations. Until it happens to them. Then all of a sudden they see the problem.
Re:terrorism (Score:5, Informative)
Re:terrorism (Score:5, Funny)
Anyone who starts a moral sermon with "Son" is appealing to emotions and not logic in order to hide their own lack of reason. You can dismiss what they say right from the start.
There's so much wrong with this bullshit that I don't even know where to start. So I won't. I'll just let this stand here as a testament to the sanctimonious bullshit that people can spew out.
Well, it seems somebody can't handle the truth.
Catalyst (Score:5, Insightful)
If anything good comes of this situation it would be nice if Swartz were to become the Mohamed Bouazizi [wikipedia.org] of prosecutorial reform in the US. Unlikely, but one can hope.
Shame on MIT (Score:5, Insightful)
It used to be the home of the hacker culture.
Psychopaths (Score:5, Insightful)
These people seem to be soulless automatons devoid of any compassion and quite willing to destroy a life without good reason just so they can advance their own careers a bit. This behavior is the hallmark of dangerous psychopaths. People like that belong into a closed mental institutions, not into positions of power.
Different circumstance, same outcome (Score:5, Informative)
The group of psychopaths also known as the Roswell City Council pushed Andrew Wordes (also known as the Roswell Chicken Man) to take his life in March 2012 [patch.com].
Re: (Score:3)
Not psychopaths. Fused with their jobs + lack of empathy. Just like IT-people can sometimes have a problem imagining that there are other people who do not know, understand, or even like, IT, these people cannot empathize with other people that are not lawyers, or bureaucrats. They think that they have the most wonderful job in the world and imagine that everyone else wants to have it too. And therefore, do not mind dealing with the lawsuits and the paperwork. Those are fun challenges!
Re: (Score:3)
Lack of empathy is one of the main characteristics of a psychopath. I meant that quite literally as a diagnosis, not as an insult. The problem is that these people do not see or understand what they are actually doing to others. That is what makes them so dangerous. They do not belong into positions of power as they will kill, maim and torture without remorse or regret or even understanding what they did.
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Psychopaths (Score:4, Insightful)
I hate to say this - but I will - most of the so-called privileged class is so heartless and cruel and uncaring that they'd lose NO sleep over doing such things to other people.
congress, judges, police, governors, you name it: they are so protected and insulated from the real world, they don't UNDERSTAND what compassion and reasonableness is.
Re: (Score:3)
When people use the term 'psychopath' they generally mean 'sociopath' which is a clinical term for someone without so called normal emotional responses toward others. I remember my psych 101 prof saying something like, "they can murder or seriously injure someone like you or I might take a drink at a water fountain." It just refers to people who feel not the slightest hint of empathy toward others. Who don't tend to feel guilt or remorse about their own actions at all even when they violate their own belief
Re:Psychopaths (Score:5, Funny)
When people use the term 'psychopath' they generally mean 'sociopath' which is a clinical term for someone without so called normal emotional responses toward others. I remember my psych 101 prof saying something like, "they can murder or seriously injure someone like you or I might take a drink at a water fountain."
Ah, so with utter revulsion, and only if you cannot think of an alternative?
Who? (Score:5, Informative)
Swartz was an American computer programmer, writer, archivist, political organizer, and Internet activist. Swartz co-authored the "RSS 1.0" specification of RSS, and built the Web site framework web.py and the architecture for the Open Library. He also built Infogami, a company that merged with Reddit in its early days, through which he became an equal owner of the merged company.
On January 6, 2011, Swartz was arrested in connection with systematic downloading of academic journal articles from JSTOR, which became the subject of a federal investigation.[2][3] JSTOR offended Swartz mainly for two reasons: it charged large fees for access to these articles but did not compensate the authors and it ensured that huge numbers of people are denied access to the scholarship produced by America's colleges and universities.[4][5] On January 11, 2013, Swartz was found dead in his Crown Heights, Brooklyn, apartment, where he had hanged himself.
- Wikipedia
Re:Who? (Score:5, Insightful)
As a reader of Hacker News [ycombinator.com] I'm getting a bit sick of this coverage myself. Last night, 9 of the 10 top stories were in relation to Aaron and the whole situation. The guy did some great work, but he never even got into a courtroom to see how things would play out. The other thing to note is that it was known even publicly that he suffered from depression [aaronsw.com]. A high-stress situation plus depression is the recipe for this type of situation.
I'm not say either side (the people making him into a martyr or prosecutor for going after him) is right or wrong with what they are doing. But to me, the reaction I've been seeing so far from those on sites like Hacker News seems to be a little far out there.
JSTOR offers condolences (Score:5, Informative)
JSTOR has posted a condolences note on their website [jstor.org].
stopbullying.gov * (Score:3, Insightful)
* the government reserves the right to engage in bullying any time it wishes, for any reason. In this case parents are encouraged to teach their children that bystanding is appropriate and expected.
Petition to remove the DA (Score:5, Informative)
It's a start, though what I'd really like to see is some proper judicial reform, so we can bring some sanity to the judicial system.
Links to the Ars coverage of this story:
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/01/internet-pioneer-and-information-activist-takes-his-own-life/ [arstechnica.com]
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/01/family-blames-us-attorneys-for-death-of-aaron-swartz/ [arstechnica.com]
Reassign, not remove (Score:3)
This person needs to be in charge of the investigation into the sub-prime mortgage fiasco.
Then maybe some charges will actually be brought against the people running these 'too big to fail' banks.
Re:Petition to remove the DA (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Petition to remove the DA (Score:5, Insightful)
Do we really want a world where a person could face 35 years for trespassing (normal max: 30 days in jail and $100 fine) (1) but merely have to defer a portion of their bonus for laundering money for drug kingpins and terrorists (2)?
(1) http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/09/feds-go-overboard-in-prosecuting-information-activist/ [arstechnica.com]
(2) http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/outrageous-hsbc-settlement-proves-the-drug-war-is-a-joke-20121213 [rollingstone.com]
Just taking orders (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
But that's no reason to simply ignore the behavior of the prosecutor. "Just following orders" is not an excuse. Regardless, he wasn't following orders, it was his decision to go after this case. The district attorneys have a lot of leeway about what they do, a lot of which ends up being po
The Aaron Swartz Act (Score:5, Interesting)
1. To reform the Federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986 to rationalize it with the 21st century by the following measure
A. Repeal any and all language from the CFAA that originated in the Espionage Act of 1918 or its amended forms such as the McCarran Internal Security Act or the Subversive Activities Control Act of the 1950s.
B. Alter the definition of "Protected Computer" so that the act only covers Federal Government and Financial computer systems, and no others.
C. Remove any and all language that creates a crime simply because a computer is involved in an activity, where otherwise the activity would not be considered a crime.
D. Specifically state that the Interstate Commerce Clause does not apply to the Act. Almost all modern communications are 1. done on a computer, and 2. interstate in nature. Whereas it is against the spirit of the Founding Fathers to have the Federal Goverment control every single communication in a Free country, this act should be adopted by the congress and signed by the President.
Re: (Score:3)
I'm not up on the subtlties of this law, but as a layman:
'Protected Computers' should include those machines that store personal information. Many machines do that, some store personal information over the long term, others over the sort term, so it is difficult to express exactly what should and what shouldn't fit that definition.
Further to that, the definition of 'computer' is getting harrier all the time. Where does one start and another begin?
So maybe it makes more sense to define protected information
Re: (Score:3)
Alter the definition of "Protected Computer" so that the act only covers Federal Government and Financial computer systems, and no others.
I think there needs to be more specificity there.
At least in my state, all corporations are considered financial institutions, so any computer owned by a corporation technically qualifies as a "Financial computer system".
Quip? (Score:3)
but not nearly as important as he tries to make it out to be,' quipped United States Attorney Carmen M. Ortiz
Quipped? Chided? These words do not mean what you seem to think they mean.
Re: (Score:3)
I think "mocking" the insect she was about to squash characterizes it more correctly.
I think you're inferring what it pleases you to infer. It looks like a plain statement of fact to me, and the document goes on to explain the reasoning behind the statement in detail. How could it have been worded to not sound mocking, to you?
A Modest Question (Score:5, Informative)
How many MIT student pranks ended with felony charges?
I highly recommend reading Alex Stamos' thoughts on Aaron Swartz:
The Truth about Aaron Swartz's "Crime"
http://unhandled.com/2013/01/12/the-truth-about-aaron-swartzs-crime/ [unhandled.com]
such BS (Score:3, Interesting)
1. Swartz wasn't facing 30+ years unless he already had a bunch of prior violent felony convictions. Under the federal sentencing guidelines, he was facing maybe 6-24 months if he was convicted of everything.
2. It was a victimless crime if you don't count anyone that works/studies at MIT, works at JSTOR, or uses JSTOR anywhere in the world. The entire campus was cut off as JSTOR/MIT scrambled to stop Swartz, who repeatedly attempted to circumvent the blocks put up by JSTOR/MIT over a period of weeks. Reports from JSTOR indicated that Swartz activities were causing servers to crash and were impacting other users. JSTOR backed down because of bad publicity, not because Swartz caused no harm.
3. Trespassing, breaking and entering, unauthorized use of a computer system, and denial-of-service attacks are all crimes. Prosecutors don't need support of every victim or even any victim to pursue a case because they represent the People who have an interest in stopping such activities. Every day, wife beaters are convicted despite the protests of their spouses. You would think a law professor would know this kind of stuff but Lessig, by all appearances, is not much of a lawyer just a supreme bullshitter.
4. Swartz had a lot of time to realize that he should probably stop his activities because the admins were on to him and trying to stop him but instead he escalated his crimes.
5. Harvard must be incredibly embarassed to have brought this guy on as a Fellow in their Center for Ethics.
6. There should an award in memory of Swartz for the person who's own actions cock up the greatest streak of good fortune. Maybe he didn't screw up as bad as OJ Simpson but you can't have a memorial award in the name of someone who isn't dead.
The system is broken (Score:4, Insightful)
and won't be fixed by itself. You can get 30 years for making public something that should be, get sued for millons of dollars for copying a few songs, sued for billons for doing common sense implementations. But if you screw the entire world economy (causing indirectly the dead of thousands of people) you get even more money, driving drunk have barely any legal consequences or carrying assault weapons in populated areas for "defense" is all ok (to put very few examples, is far worse than this). Justice is a nice meaningless (or with a real meaning that have no relation with what people think it means) word by now.
And you can't use the legal or political system to fix it, as not only they broken it, but would break it even more given the opportunity (i.e. the golden opportunity of asking them to fix it).
With a hopeless situation like this, im not surprised that people suicide themselves when this mess touch them.
Looks like Carmen Ortiz's really is out of the... (Score:4, Interesting)
governor's race now. If she had any hope of running for governor, as many claim that she does, this kind of PR should put an end to it. Bullying a 26 y/o until he commits suicide isn't going to play well even if the average person doesn't understand the case. And if what has been said so far about the case (i.e. ambitious prosecutor trying to make a name for herself over-zealously pursues disproportionate punishment for a victimless crime when she probably doesn't even understand how a network operates or what JSTOR is), then she is even more screwed. It's a small consolation but at least it's something.
What happened to the US? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Insightful)
Fuck off asshole. If you are facing decades in prison and being forever named a felon, wouldn't you consider it?
These prosecutors need to pay for their crimes. They need to be fired, disbarred, and then thrown in jail.
Culprit #1: Stephen P. Heymann, the head of the Cybercrime Unit and lead prosecutor
Culprit #2: Carmen M. Ortiz, US Attorney (and Bostonian of the Year as Twitter tells me)
Sign the petitions:
[1] [whitehouse.gov]
[2] [whitehouse.gov]
Re:Yawn (Score:4, Insightful)
For what, AC? For what, exactly, should "the prosecutors ... be fired, disbarred, and then thrown in jail?" Please lay out a compelling case based on something other than your circumstantial reasoning, ad-hominem attacks, and naked assertion?
Also: as meaningless as petitions are, they'd be slightly less meaningless if you at least courageously offered those an ability to sign a petition in the opposite direction too. In fact, this should be a moral requirement for all those who ever make a petition.
Re:Yawn (Score:4, Insightful)
They deceived the court that multiple felonies were committed. And their intimidation lead to suicide. There are a multitude of charges that can be filed. Find a prosecutor with the balls to charge another prosecutor, and these two will be in jail.
Remember Rudy? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Remember Rudy? (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember Mitnick? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Remember Mitnick? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Remember Mitnick? (Score:4, Informative)
For some reason US courts tend to put people in jail longer for hacking a computer and not stealing anything than for multiple violent armed robberies lately.
That reason is fear. Well over 95% of the US population (probably true for most countries) knows absolutely nothing about hackers except what they see in movies and on the news. They see them as anti-social control freaks bent on world domination that can only be stopped by being locked up or "reverse-hacked" by some skinny guy they temporarily let out of prison for having done the same thing. Americans (think they) know how to stop an armed robber, they shoot him with THEIR gun. They feel utterly powerless against hackers because you can't physically get to them, they have no technical abilities of their own to get to them virtually and governments and media have been slowly ramping up their stories of "1 geek with a payphone can start a nuclear war, shut down all power stations or make all the computers explode in a fiery shower of red and yellow sparks". This is the first time since magic was invented the public has had to deal with something they are completely and utterly unable to understand or fell they can protect themselves from.
Re: (Score:3)
Let's not kid ourselves. They weren't after him for downloading articles. They were after him because of his work on demandprogress.org, rootstrikers and other political activism. As with the dubious accusations (not charges) against Assange, the charges over Schwartz' alleged crimes were trumped up to stop him from doing what he obviously considered important work: political activism challenging the status quo.
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Insightful)
I thought deceiving the court was the primary job of lawyers. Every time I have needed lawyers it was either to manipulate the court in ways I didn't believe I was able to, or to provide extra intimidation to the opposition.
If everyone was completely honest and forthcoming, we wouldn't even need lawyers. Judges would work just fine on their own.
Re: (Score:3)
If everyone was completely honest and forthcoming, we wouldn't even need lawyers. Judges would work just fine on their own.
If everyone was completely honest and forthcoming we wouldn't need judges either.
Re: (Score:3)
Not true--just because both sides of an argument are honest and forthcoming doesn't mean that they're both right. They often have different understandings of a situation that come from their own unique perspectives and beliefs. Judges are useful arbiters for determining which side is correct.
Rob
That's not going to happen (Score:3)
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Informative)
...and what law was broken?
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/01/family-blames-us-attorneys-for-death-of-aaron-swartz/ [arstechnica.com]
Stamos goes on to write that MIT runs an “open, unmonitored and unrestricted network on purpose. Their head of network security admitted as much in an interview Aaron’s attorneys and I conducted in December. MIT is aware of the controls they could put in place to prevent what they consider abuse, such as downloading too many PDFs from one website or utilizing too much bandwidth, but they choose not to.” In addition, he wrote, MIT did not require users of its network to agree to any terms of use, nor did JSTOR take any steps to prevent large-scale downloads of its PDFs.
"millions of dollars".. in ACADEMIC papers? really?
worst case is trespassing because he entered the network closet w/o permission. tresspassing does not warrant 30 years. ever.
overzealous resume padding is the reason the US Atty continued with this sham.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
He wasn't facing decades in jail. He was facing the possibility of decades in jail. He didn't even fight. I don't know him, and I don't know enough of the particulars of this case to definitively say whether he acted cowardly or not, but on the surface, it does look that way. Regardless, my heart goes out to his friends and family. Coward or not, suicide is one of the most selfish actions an individual can take. Even if your life sucks at the moment, you are more than your own life, and suicide hurts
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Insightful)
You're questioning his strength of character? He was charged because he wanted to liberate academic documents. He drew the ire of the Feds because he freely released court documents. He stood up against SOPA. And he helped launch Creative Commons. I'm pretty fucking sure he had a shitload of "strength of character".
perhaps (Score:5, Insightful)
When I was in grad school, there was one tenured professor who was true scum; had only graduated 3 PhD's in 15 years, had an affair with a student, had one student who had previously committed suicide, I can go on. At the same time, he had over 300 publications and books to his name, was known and respected in his field, and was a fellow of a prestigious academic society. During my third year, his second student committed suicide. This was the tipping point; within the year, the professor was forced to retire and is no longer overseeing students.
I can only hope this tragic event becomes a tipping point for copyright reform as well.
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Insightful)
It should also be noted that depression is considered a mental illness, not a lack of character. It's likely that he was unable to pay, not unwilling.
Re:Yawn (Score:4, Insightful)
He didn't die for what he believed in. He died to escape.
Re: (Score:3)
That is what a trial resolves - if whatever the defendant did was illegal or not. Unfortunately, he chose not to resolve that question leaving it up to the next guy to do.
Re: (Score:3)
Indeed, he likely could have made much more of a difference even if he had decided to spend every last penny he had on his defense (and then the government would have been required to pay for the remainder of his defense), fought the charges, won, and then committed suicide leaving a detailed explanation of how the case the prosecu
Re: (Score:3)
However, completely banning them is heavy handed. Sometimes suspects will gladly plea guilty to a lesser charge when they are guilty of a greater charge but the prosecutor decides, for example, that a diversion program plus probation (possible under the lesser charge) is better for all than a prison or jail sentence (the minimum punishment under the greater charge). Such arrangements are sometimes the result of the prosecutor looking at the details and the per
Re: (Score:3)
Uh, no. Strength of character. Asshole. When you're dead, you're gone. No more life, no more things you love. At least with life you have a *chance* at redemption.
Yeah, look at this guy. [wikimedia.org] Another weak-willed loser who didn't have the balls to tough it out.
Re:Yawn (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, there's a victim complex in the west. I don't think it applies in this case. Like Alan Turing, who also killed himself, the man was a hero who hit his limit for how much he could take. There's so much apathy towards so many issues these days I'm surprised it doesn't happen more often.
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not equating them, I'm saying they're both heroes. Swartz was trying to stand up against what seems to be a copyright controlled government (the JSTOR issue, SOPA, etc). We could use a lot more people like him. I'm also saying that when you push a person past their limit bad things happen. It's not easy standing up for what you believe in surrounded by either apathy or abuse.
Re: (Score:3)
There's no need to end up in a courtroom if you are willing to kill yourself first. Suicide makes you immune to pretty much any punishment. He could have shot one of the prosecutors and escaped punishment by just killing himself. Being suicidal, genuinely suicidal, makes you tremendously powerful for a short time. It allows you to completely ignore any consequences of whatever action you might want to take. And the idea that suicide isn't heroic is merely your opinion. I disagree.
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Informative)
That used to be role of the media.
Then media was consolidated in the hands of the few with vested interest in not shaking the boat when they have installed their own captain and navigator crew.
What makes you think this 4th branch of government wouldn't just get corrupted like media did?
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Insightful)
If the GP AC had made more than just a passing joke (tying in recent gun and sexual assault cases at the same time, it takes some skill and luck to pull something like that off), then AC would not have been marked a troll. Throw in the response that JSTOR *withdrew* its allegations, but the prosecutors pursued the case anyway, and we have a situation where there are serious questions about the prosecutors.
Specifically:
Why did they pursue a case when the plaintiffs want out?
a) Was it because they thought what he allegedly did was so terrible that it must be prosecuted?
b) Were they thinking this was a meal ticket to fame?
I don't know, and I'd sure as hell like to find out. If it was a), then I'd like to know what's happening with our laws and to our justice departments so make a copyright case like this so "life and death." This is especially damning in the light of the US attorneys not pursuing HSBC for aiding terrorism and organized crime. If it was b), then these people are pretty sick, and I would hold them partly responsible for Aaron Swartz's death, at least morally if not legally.
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Insightful)
I absolutely agree with you.
That doesn't preclude charging the prosecutors with a whole array of harassment and misconduct-related actions.
Unfortunately, the US has a serious problem wherein prosecutors have effectively infinite resources to harass someone; on top of which, we reward them for convictions, not for serving justice. On the flip side of that, public defenders lose money for every hour they spend on a case vs working at their "real" jobs; and since they don't generally do it as their primary job (more like an act of compulsory charity on the side), they have little incentive to care how they perform in that role. Thus, you have a supposedly-antagonistic system where both sides have strong incentive to push everyone brought up on charges to settle, regardless of guilt.
You want to fix the system? We need to have "prosecutor pays" for privately retained defense; and we need to ban settlements entirely.
Yes, that means every two-bit punk who shoplifts gets to hire Johnny Cochran. And yes, I realize how much the second point there would slow down the system - Or more accurately, it would mean nonviolent cases with no "real" damages, such as Swartz', would never have made it past a private student misconduct panel at MIT, and we'd have a brilliant but bored kid still alive.
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree. if the full power of the gov is coming down on you, the gov SHOULD also pay for your legal fees, and good defense people, too.
else, it is purely and clearly bullying. legal bullying.
the way we win hearts and minds in the world is by example. the Rest Of World(tm) looks at us and is not convinced that they want to import anything AT ALL like american freedom and justice.
if we don't start fixing our broken-ways, we will never be taken seriously by the world. and yes, we have dropped in our high moral ground several notches over the last several decades.
does anyone in command CARE about how we look? never mind how we act, but at least give the impression of fairness!
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Informative)
Either an underpaid version of a lawyer doing a job they'd rather not, or the bottom of the legal barrel that can't get a better job.
Are you aware that they are available to those charged in all criminal prosecutions?
Are you aware that the truth of that depends on your financial situation and willingness to bankrupt yourself defending against an opponent with essentially infinite resources?
The 6th amendment guarantees your right to counsel. It doesn't guarantee your right to free, or even necessarily very good counsel.
Re:Yawn (Score:5, Interesting)
I have an alternate proposal. The total cost of investigation + prosecution must be available for the defense. That is, if the cops and the crime lab and the prosecutors office spend $500,000 on the case, then you get that amount for the defense.
The reason is simple - if someone is clearly guilty, the investigation is comparatively cheap. And if the cops spend a million bucks on prosecution, this usually means their case is weak and they are trying to amplify this weak signal as much as possible.
Re:So now (Score:5, Insightful)
we'll criticize people that had no personal tie to a person for not recognizing their true mental state? How many immediate family members do not recognize a suicidal condition in someone? But we expect a lawyer to see it?
Who or what are you talking about?
Maybe you would be suicidal too if facing 35 years for downloading scientific articles, when the people you downloaded them from don't want to proceed but the justice department says "too bad".
That's the point the poster is making, isn't it? It doesn't matter who it is, being on the receiving end of a witch hunt is enough to ruin anyone's life.
35 years in prison for downloading scientific articles. Really? What a great country he and I share, where we give those convicted of murder softer sentences than we do for some "copyright infringers".
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Stop the bullshit (Score:4, Insightful)
35 years was the maximum he could be sentenced to, that doesn't mean he was going to get it.
That case also started 2 years ago and the case hadn't undergone any startling twists that explain a suicide. Yes, after arrest I can understand, after a search I can understand, after being found guilty I can understand, after sentencing I can understand, in jail I can understand.
But in the investigation period when the lawyers are duking it out over admissible evidence? Either it had to be a slow deterioration in his mental state, which his family should have noted OR something else happened. That linked letter from the prosecutor is to trivial to kill yourself over unless you been slowly going over the edge in any case.
The guy went against the law as a form of protest, he knew that what he was doing was illegal and wanted that to change. And his treatment was legal letters. SCARY! A while ago, I called a scumbag to account himself for claiming the womens right to vote was achieved without violence by linking to just one of the countless incidents of women being arrested and tortured in jail. And these women endured. This guy offed himself over an email?
Then either he was always a unstable person OR he is a crybaby who wanted to look cool by protesting and then pissed himself when "The man" came down on him OR something else is going on entirely.
I think he had a cause, I think he could have expected that it would land him court and I don't think a person like that panics over a letter in a legal case that is/was far from concluded. That kind of person does NOT kill himself over a letter from a prosecutor. Read the letter, it is a trivial non-issue in the run up to a court case, it isn't a smoking gun, it isn't saying "we got you and you are going to federal pound in the ass jail sonny boy". It is almost saying "your lawyer got a good point but obviously I am not going to say it like that but you won this round". Chiding? Hardly.
Now I don't know him at all, don't know his personality (the real one, not the media one) but I think something more is going on. Either the pressure on him was far greater then we know, he was killed or his he had other mental issues already.
It is NOT the job of the prosecutor to weigh every communication on a silver platter to see if it might push someone over the edge. It is the job of family and the person himself to recognize mental issues and seek help. Something is missing here, normal people even under stress of an investigation do NOT off themselves over the linked letter. I would examine if there are other causes for an unstable mental condition that could have been triggered by anything, something as "trivial" as taking the Christmas decorations down.
We like when something tragic happens, to blame someone. It can be something as stupid as a cat not wanting to be petted that day that pushes people over the edge. That his family is so quickly ready to put the blame on others is to me a red flag. How hard did his family push him to succeed? Most boys at 14 worry about girls (how icky they are and how you can stop them thinking you are icky) this guy was designing RSS. Many a wonder kid has far from a happy youth. Who pushed this guy the hardest? The prosecutor or his family and friends who wanted him to achieve time and time again? Far more kids commit suicide because of pushy parents who are never satisfied then over long running legal cases that so far have NOT gone against him (as far as I know I freely admit, please feel free to put me right and show links to articles were it was becoming clear that he was going to loose this case). How hard was Lessig pushing yet again for someone ELSE to fight HIS fight for him with Lessig not being the one facing jail?
I think this case is going to stir up a real nasty mess with pushy parents and people expecting Swartz to fight everyone elses battle but him alone the one facing jail.
Re:Stop the bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
What part of 'contributed to his death' do you not understand?
It's established at this point that he had bouts of depression. But it's also obvious that facing the prospect of 35 years in jail would be extremely stressful and was in all likelihood what he was depressed about when he committed suicide.
And yes, he probably wouldn't have gotten the 35 years, but you can't dismiss that point, for at least two reasons.
One, he shouldn't have been on trial in the first place; the 'victim' dropped its claims against him; at worst, he should have been charged with mischief.
The second reason relates to prosecutorial bullying: if they don't expect to get all 35 years, then part of their strategy obviously involves charging people with crimes they can't be convicted of in an attempt to get them to settle. It is intimidation by the prosecutor.
As an outsider looking in it appears that the prosecutors in this case had no sense of proportion and/or threw everything they could think of at him in the hopes that some things would stick.
Remember if you might what actually happened to precipitate this sad series of events:
- He wrote a script using wget or similar to download JSTOR articles (which by the way are freely accessible to the public if you are on a public terminal on campus, at least at my alma mater).
- He left a laptop in a utility box overnight, running the script
That's it. He was caught, he returned the downloaded JSTOR articles, JSTOR dropped any civil charges it had (because there was no harm done).
But MIT left him out to dry and the prosecutors charged him with a series of crimes totaling 35 years in prison, leaving him to spend years and, from what I heard, a huge part if not all of his savings, defending himself in court.
It is patently ridiculous. Overloading of charges has got to stop. The prosecutors in this case should be fired as an example to other US prosecutors.
Re:Stop the bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
A lot of words to say that the Feds don't need to have any sense of perspective.
A bank can money launder terrorists' and drug producers' money, and face no time (HSBC) or can almost single handedly cause a nationwide mortgage crises (Angelo Mozillo), and face nothing but a small (on a percentage of income basis) fine. A kid can trespass and face virtually the rest of his life in jail.
You: Gotta love the Feds. More power to them!
Re:Stop the bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
35 years was the maximum he could be sentenced to, that doesn't mean he was going to get it.
Nevertheless, despite of all the respect I have in general for the USA, a country in which someone could get 35 years in prison for downloading scientific articles seems hardly civilized to me. It's barbaric. US lawmakers would be well advised to take a look at the rest of the industrialized, democratic first world countries from time to time and check what's considered adequate there. In some domains the discrepancy has become huge.
Whats even worse about this whole sad story is that (i) it is common among scientists to request articles from public mailing lists and from friends when you cannot access them and that (ii) it is a crucial part of scientific method to be open so people can scrutinize conjectures and results.
Re: (Score:3)
Take for example Germany. The maximum sentence for non-commercial copyright infringement is 3 years (the one that applies to the case) and the maximum sentence for commercial one is 5 years. The maximum sentence for trespassing is 1 year. Bear in mind, these are the maximum sentences. That's just an example. You will not find find any country in Europe where you could get 35 years in prison for doing what Aaron did, not even remotely.
As a rule of thumb, divide the maximum US sentence in a case by ten and yo
Re: (Score:3)
The trial was due to start in a few weeks, contrary to what you say in the second paragraph about no reason for the timing. Also, "US Attorney Chided Swartz On Day of Suicide" is the title of this post.
Re:So now (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:So now (Score:5, Informative)
About 30 days in jail and a hundred bucks for trespassing. That'd be the going rate.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/12/aaron-swartz-heroism-suicide1 [guardian.co.uk]
Re:So now (Score:5, Insightful)
So hiding a laptop in a closet in order to download scientific articles is a crime worthy of decades in prison?
So many people here seem to have no sense of perspective. Yes, what Swartz did was (probably) illegal. It was civil disobedience, not malicious or for personal gain, but I think some punishment would have been reasonable: a misdemeanor (at most), maybe a fine or probation or community service. But a felony and significant federal prison time? That's fucking insane. There was no damage. He was an asset to the community, not a threat. Lessig said is best: 'Somehow, we need to get beyond the “I’m right so I’m right to nuke you” ethics that dominates our time.'
Re:So now (Score:4, Interesting)
Does it really matter whether it is 35 years (essentially a life sentence) or only 10? Either way I think suicide is a 100% rational choice in such a circumstance. You can wait until you are found guilty and sentenced but by then it will be too late to suicide via a method of your choice and it may not be possible at all.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
No, we expect prosecutors not to be utter shitbags. This one Carmen M Ortiz is obviously a psychopath that should never ever serve in a public office.
She needs to hear that she's nothing but a mean, horrible subhuman.
Re:So now (Score:5, Interesting)
No, we expect prosecutors not to be utter shitbags.
But we do expect them to be shitbags. We reward prosecutors based on conviction rates, rather than just outcomes. Prosecutors are especially rewarded for winning "tough cases" (ie, cases where the defendant is likely to have been innocent).
This one Carmen M Ortiz is obviously a psychopath that should never ever serve in a public office.
Stop blaming an individual, when the real problem is the adversarial system.
Systems like this have been fixed before. In the 1970s and 1980s police were evaluated by their arrest rate. So the police were "successful" as arrest rates climbed as crime rates soared. In the 1990s we switched to evaluating the police on overall crime rates, and gave them an incentive to proactively discourage crime rather than just react to it. The result has been lower crime rates, and especially lower violent crime rates.
Now it is time to do the something similar for prosecutors.
Re:So now (Score:5, Insightful)
Stop blaming an individual, when the real problem is the adversarial system.
No. Fuck that.
I'm tired of the sentiment that the system is to blame, or "don't hate the player, hate the game". At some point, an individual made the decision to do this. They checked their morals at the door, and decided to abuse their authority for their own personal gain.
While the system is set up to reward that behaviour, it doesn't change the fact that Carmen M Ortiz chose to do this. At some point, we need to hold people who make decisions like this, whether or not the system encourages them to, responsible, and hold them up as the immoral SOBs that they are.
If we don't, the system will never change.
Re:So now (Score:5, Insightful)
First, lots of people knew about Swartz' depression, especially his family. Secondly, the US attorney's office is being criticized for not seeking justice, but for seeking unusually harsh punishment. Swartz was afraid of being sentenced to 30 years in prison. You don't think 30 years is excessive?
Re:So now (Score:4, Insightful)
we'll criticize people that had no personal tie to a person for not recognizing their true mental state? How many immediate family members do not recognize a suicidal condition in someone? But we expect a lawyer to see it?
Look, stupid: Harassing, intimidating, bullying Aaron Swartz, and destroying his life... that was the injustice system doing it, not the family members.
The world would've been much better off today with Aaron Swartz alive, instead of you and/or the prosecutors, who are squandering resources on bullying rather than going after real criminals, like themselves or the fuckers who've fucked up this country.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:US Attorneys are often sadistic power hungry sc (Score:5, Insightful)
You mean the scum who have no power and influence. And of course the innocent who get railroaded. Those are the people prosecutors go after. But in our two-tiered justice system, the type of scum with vast sums of money and political friends -- slap on the wrist.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/outrageous-hsbc-settlement-proves-the-drug-war-is-a-joke-20121213 [rollingstone.com] :
Re:US ATTORNEY DOES HIS JOB (Score:5, Informative)
Because the whole case was a sham put forth by the US AGO. Even JSTOR, the "offended" party, didn't want to pursue the matter. It was the US government that butchered this man with their brutal legal system and relentless pursuit of him. Make no mistake about that.
The pursuit was even more vicious and determined than that of the MPAA and RIAA with their letters and lawsuits over copyright violations.
Re:Pirate??? (Score:5, Interesting)
The Man(tm) wanted to put him away for virtually his whole life.
yes, at that age, x+35 IS your whole life.
I bet a lot of people would off themselves if faced and what is, effectively, the end of their lifes and the absolute end of their freedom.
NH says 'live free or die!'. I think living free is so important, maybe NH has a point, there.
Re:Pirate??? (Score:5, Insightful)
So he pirated a few documents and distributed them? Why did this end in his death?
Because he was weak?
You should find out whether you are a psychopath. Your response strongly indicated that you are. If so, there are a number of high risks that you face that are not present in sane human beings. Understanding them helps with avoiding them.
Re: (Score:3)
see, THIS is why I worry more about a government out of control and having too much (domestic) power. the Terrorists(tm) are not likely to ever mess with you or me. its extremely unlikely that we will experience foreign terrorism in our lifetimes. statistically speaking.
but its likely that the government will try to fuck you over and, unlike a freight train, it will BACK UP and keep running you over until you're finished.
I fear the government more than I fear the mafia or terrorists. the difference is t
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
Re:It's sad, but "accused criminal" still appropri (Score:5, Insightful)
He was probably unwilling to yield to such pressure. And do you know what happens when you don't? They go through with the maximum threatened and crush you like a bug. And everyone blames you for not accepting the lesser bargain.
Actually, it pretty much is. Not for someone who makes a living committing crimes, of course. But for anyone who wants to ever make a good living honestly. Few companies hire felons for any but the most menial positions, and many companies even vet contractors for felonies as well.
And of course, there's always the question of whether he'd have survived prison. People willing to stand up for themselves, but without the personal physical strength to back it up, nor the social ability to assemble a gang of followers, are unlikely to do well in prison