Jeremy Hammond of LulzSec Pleads Guilty To Stratfor Attack 192
eldavojohn writes "After facing 30 years to life imprisonment and pleading not guilty to charges last year, Jeremy Hammond has pleaded guilty to his alleged involvement in Anonymous' hacking of Stratfor. The self proclaimed hacktivist member of LulzSec, who has compared his situation to that of the late Aaron Swartz, explained his reasoning in his plea: 'Today I pleaded guilty to one count of violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. This was a very difficult decision. I hope this statement will explain my reasoning. I believe in the power of the truth. In keeping with that, I do not want to hide what I did or to shy away from my actions. This non-cooperating plea agreement frees me to tell the world what I did and why, without exposing any tactics or information to the government and without jeopardizing the lives and well-being of other activists on and offline. During the past 15 months I have been relatively quiet about the specifics of my case as I worked with my lawyers to review the discovery and figure out the best legal strategy. There were numerous problems with the government's case, including the credibility of FBI informant Hector Monsegur. However, because prosecutors stacked the charges with inflated damages figures, I was looking at a sentencing guideline range of over 30 years if I lost at trial. I have wonderful lawyers and an amazing community of people on the outside who support me. None of that changes the fact that I was likely to lose at trial. But, even if I was found not guilty at trial, the government claimed that there were eight other outstanding indictments against me from jurisdictions scattered throughout the country. If I had won this trial I would likely have been shipped across the country to face new but similar charges in a different district. The process might have repeated indefinitely. ... I did what I believe is right.'"
Re:New strategy in criminal law? (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason it sounds like patent trolling is more because it sounds like extortion. They leveraged the law to force him to plea. If he hadn't he could have spent years going around the country until someone convicted him. I don't know much about him or if he deserves his conviction or not but that seems like a flaw in the justice system that should be fixed.
Re:New strategy in criminal law? (Score:2, Insightful)
Not at all like Swartz (Score:3, Insightful)
Unlike the LulzSec crew, Swartz was not politically motivated and did not do anything "black hat". Comparing the two sets of CFAA charges are like comparing someone who got a speeding ticket to someone who got a DUI, since they're both moving violations.
Re:New strategy in criminal law? (Score:4, Insightful)
The reason it sounds like patent trolling is more because it sounds like extortion. They leveraged the law to force him to plea. If he hadn't he could have spent years going around the country until someone convicted him. I don't know much about him or if he deserves his conviction or not but that seems like a flaw in the justice system that should be fixed.
They have evidence he broke the law on numerous occasions. A murderer being charged for multiple murders isn't a loophole.
One side of the story... (Score:3, Insightful)
I do have to point out that his statement is rather blatently self-justification and self-serving. Yes, indeed, he sounds like a sweet-well intentioned innocent, and the evil government is the villain, when he tells the story.
Question (Score:4, Insightful)
I wonder when Stratfor is going to be prosecuted for engaging in corporate espionage? Never, because most Fortune 500 companies and government intelligence agencies rely on this private corporation to know what is going on in the world. Can we say "too big to fail?"
Re:Lies? (Score:5, Insightful)
Because Habeus Corpus is dead. Murdered in an attempt to "be tough on crime." I think these convictions will do very little to deter other anonymous splinter groups.
Reminder that what this guy leaked that he's being prosecuted for: The company stratfor was using their government sponsored spying program to also spy on companies in order to provide Goldman Sachs with insider information through a foreign owned subsidiary, in order to dodge US insider trading laws.
Then the government arrests him, and not them.
Re:New strategy in criminal law? (Score:1, Insightful)
Even if this is true (that they have bulletproof evidence), given the fact that this tactics is often used against people who later turn out to be innocent, it ought to be banned in general anyway.
Why should we encourage crime sprees? If I know I will only get charged with one instance of a crime, I'm going to rob a dozen 7-11s instead of one. You should not be rewarded for committing more crimes.
Re:lulzsec is not the good guys (Score:5, Insightful)
The Boston Tea party: Some hooligans in the US in Boston dressed up as native Americans and dumped the tea cargo into the harbor. That was vandalism. It wasn't to protest just one thing either, there were multiple issues the protesters were upset about. I suspect that were something similar to happen today, Fox would give them the same treatment they gave the occupy wall street movement. "It's vandalism! And what are they even upset ABOUT? They can't even tell us that (at least not in few enough words to fit on a bumper sticker.)"
Anyway, they can be thieves and window smashers and still have valid political motivations. And what they've done is illegal no matter what their motivations.
Re:lulzsec is not the good guys (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not seeing anything on their page that is, on the face of it, illegal. Certainly, they seem to be getting near the edge of the law, but if they don't cross the line, there's nothing there.
They may be immoral, but the moment you start legislating morality, you open up a can of worms that can't be unopened.
Stratfor may be kind of dumb in some areas, but that doesn't make them a bad company.
Re:lulzsec is not the good guys (Score:2, Insightful)
but the moment you start legislating morality
We already do: murder, rape, theft, and other such things are illegal. They likely wouldn't be if most people had no problems with them (if we even had a society in such circumstances).
Re:One side of the story... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, there is certainly some self-serving element. I think he's probably guilty of something as well.
However, consider if you actually felt that you were innocent, and I don't mean "activist innocent", I mean you didn't actually do anything illegal. If the government decided that they wanted you in jail, they'd just have to start stacking charges on you and get you up to 30 years or so. Then you have to decide if you can win or not, charge by charge, AND you have to decide if you can pay for it.
The problem is, it is *way* too easy for the government to use this tactic, and tactic is what it is. It is tantamount to forcing a plea of guilty despite the fact that prosecutors are not sure that they could win the case. Instead of the search for truth, it becomes bullying of the worst form.
All I can say is: think twice about doing anything where you will end up on the wrong side of an Assistant US Attorney. Their job is to convict you, and they will not hesitate to use overkill to do it.
And for the rest of us.... think about how to make this go away. It is an understatement to say that it won't be easy to do, but in an age of increasing Federal presence, it is critical that these processes are firmly under control or there will be serious trouble going forward.
Re:New strategy in criminal law? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:New strategy in criminal law? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's only a flaw if you're a member of the public.
If you're part of the establishment it's a feature.
Re:lulzsec is not the good guys (Score:4, Insightful)
Declaration of Independence?
I think you missed the point. The rules you follow in social life are based on morals as defined by your cultural background, evolved over centuries of social interaction. The rights you cite are valid in places that do not care about the Declaration of Independence. The laws we follow are codified morals.
Re:New strategy in criminal law? (Score:4, Insightful)
We have the largest prison population in the world (and the largest per capita). For the supposed land of the free I think that says volumes.
Re:New strategy in criminal law? (Score:5, Insightful)
A murderer being charged for multiple murders isn't a loophole.
It's not a loophole, it's a flaw. For several reasons. Among them;
If the suspect is truly guilty of the charges then they should serve their time. Why are we letting criminals get away with serving so much less than they should simply because they plead guilty?
Studies show that a great number of innocent people will plead guilty in the plea bargain process. Students were paired with actors to perform a task. They affirmed they would not cheat before the study. Since the other 'student' was an actor, it was fully known whether the person was guilty or not. Many innocent people plead guilty when they are told they can fight the charge of cheating and risk expulsion from school or plead guilty and write an essay.
The only benefit argued by proponents of the plea bargain is that it helps speed up the judicial process for backlogged courts. I don't agree that's even a benefit. If courts are backlogged perhaps we should reassess what we criminalize and prosecute rather than speeding up the conviction process.
Re: New strategy in criminal law? (Score:5, Insightful)
At the end of the day, one of the fundamental principles of western law is that it is better to allow the guilty to keep their freedom than it is to deny freedom to the innocent. This of course assumes all trials are fair trials (to both sides).
Re:New strategy in criminal law? (Score:3, Insightful)
Weasel word it all you want. It was a lie. He committed a crime and then said that he was not guilty of the crime that he committed. You're not very sharp, are you?