H-P's Dunn Enters No Plea, Charges Dismissed

GogglesPisano writes "CNN earlier reported that former HP chairwoman Patricia Dunn would plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge of fraudulent wire communications stemming from her involvement in last year's corporate eavesdropping scandal. The story was later amended after charges again st Dunn were dropped. The original charges, four felony counts, were reduced to misdemeanors in exchange for a plea bargain. Her three co-defendants are expected to receive 96 hours of community service; in Dunn's case this sentence is likely to be waived due to illness." Update: 03/15 02:21 GMT by KD : The prosecutor in the case issued a correction to the eariler pronouncement that Dunn would plead guilty to a misdemeanor. "At court today, Patricia Dunn did not enter any plea in response to the misdemeanor count, and the court exercised its discretion by dismissing the case against her," the revised statement said.

Re:Can't you read? Charges were dropped!

[drinkypoo]

A regular joe charged with a similar felony wouldn't get a walk just because of health problems; neither should Dunn.

A regular joe charged with a similar felony probably wouldn't get a chance to plea bargain down to misdemeanor, either. If they did, they'd still get more than a few hours of community service.

Welcome to the real world, though; if you have money, you can walk. It's the capitalistic way!

CNN revisionists in action?

[Radon360]

Well, if CNN revised their article after learning that the AG office's press release was incorrect, they should have posted the revised story as a new story and put a link to the revised story in place of the first one with a note saying that it's been revised. News stories should not be treated like it were the news company's Wiki.

It's somewhat bad policy not to leave some trail of the revision history. Why do journalists feel they can be so sloppy about their work? Do the editors not take their jobs seriously anymore?

Re:Phone Cleaning

[ltbarcly]

What a bunch of crap. She's well enough to run a major corporation, but too sick to go to jail?

It goes to show you that if you're rich, you won't go to jail no matter what.

ambiguous responsibility

[smellsofbikes]

I read an interesting article in the New Yorker about this whole fiasco. The underlying theme was that lots of people were responsible for the disaster, but none of them actually realized what was going on. Dunn and Hurd, in particular, repeatedly asked both legal counsel and the people doing the problematic projects whether it was legal. I believe TNY cited evidence of five separate written requests for assessment of legality from Dunn alone, and every one of them came back with repeated assurances that everything was legal, these were routine operations, and there was no problem.
The other point of the article was that Dunn and Hurd both had access to the same material, both helped decide what needed to be done, and directed what was going on, but at the end of the day, Dunn lost her job and was charged with multiple felonies, while Hurd is now running the company.

Source of the confusion - California AG office

[SpaceLifeForm]

Link [canada.com]

The California Attorney General's office issued a statement saying that its news release "mistakenly predicted that the HP defendants would enter 'guilty' pleas to a misdemeanour count of fraudulent wire communications."

Strange that they would make a prediction. Perhaps that is a coverup as to what really happened.

Re:Can't you read? Charges were dropped!

[spun]

True, but that is not the way it should be. Justice should be blind to money and power as it is to all else except the facts relevant to the case at hand. Arguably, any system where it isn't blind to money and power is a long way from perfect.

This blatant and unapologetic nature of this decision, and others of a similar outcome, point to the particularly greedy and corrosive nature of our system of capitalism. We value money so much that we do not even attempt to disguise the fact that it can buy you out of anything. The rules are different for the rich in America, and we don't care who knows it.

Re:Sickness

[dave562]

So she spent the best years of her life climbing over other people to get to the top, and now that she's there her body is completely trashed. Hmmmmm, I think I'll stick with my $65k a year and lots of free time to exercise and eat well.

Re:Karma

[aeoo]

It's more of a "be a bad person your whole life and risk coming back the next life as a bug" sort of arrangement.

It's not like that either. Karma is a notion that effects of intentions do not vanish. Literally translated "karma" means intent. It doesn't mean "what's coming to you". The "what's coming to you" part is called karma vipaka. (the result of karma, or karmic "retribution" where retribution is not to be understood in the strictly moralistic sense)

What's unknowable about karma and its results is the specifics. Be a bad person and come back as a bug? We don't know. You can come back as a rich person. You can be a good person and come back as a bug. The specifics are not possible to calculate and/or establish.

What is generally said is that positive mindstream generally flows into positive mindstream. (Not always...no guarantees). So if you're a good person you may become a good bug with a good bug life -- positive experience. You donate lots and help lots of people and you might be reborn as a poor leper who is very happy and satisfied with life. It's not a tit for tat system as you say. No matter how absurdly good your karma is, you can be reborn in hell realm -- it's just that your life won't be that bad there. But this is uncertain.

There is an element of uncertainty in karma and karmic result/retribution. Besides the fact that specifics are unknowable, the general direction is also uncertain. Why? Because it's impossible to establish it. That's why.

The only thing we can be sure about is that the results of actions do not vanish into nothingness. But what exactly happens? Even Buddhas do not know.

Smug, self-satisfied vegans don't have nearly the lock on good karma they think they do.

That can be. But be careful tossing words around. What is the alternative to being self-satisfied? Is being self-dissatisfied more good? I don't think so. Is being smug that bad? Sure, it rubs your ego the wrong way. Is everything that rubs you the wrong way bad?

What you say seems kind of true on the surface, but under deep investigation it is not at all obvious.

Now, I'm not saying let's all be smug and self-satisfied. I'm just saying your criticism is basically hot air that you cannot support with anything other than your personal feelings (certainly not with reason or logic). Just be aware of that and it will be OK. That's what I think. :)