Hacker Threatened With 44 Felony Charges Escapes With Misdemeanor 219
An anonymous reader writes: It's no secret that prosecutors usually throw every charge they can at an alleged criminal, but the case of Aaron Swartz brought to light how poorly-written computer abuse laws lend themselves to this practice. Now, another perfect example has resolved itself: a hacker with ties to Anonymous was recently threatened with 44 felony counts of computer fraud and cyberstalking, each with its own 10-year maximum sentence. If the charges stuck, the man was facing multiple lifetimes worth of imprisonment.
But, of course, they didn't. Prosecutors struck a deal to get him to plead guilty to a single misdemeanor charge, which carried only a $10,000 fine. The man's attorney, Tor Eklund, said, "The more I looked at this, the more it seemed like an archetypal example of the Department of Justice's prosecutorial abuse when it comes to computer crime. It shows how aggressive they are, and how they seek to destroy your reputation in the press even when the charges are complete, fricking garbage."
But, of course, they didn't. Prosecutors struck a deal to get him to plead guilty to a single misdemeanor charge, which carried only a $10,000 fine. The man's attorney, Tor Eklund, said, "The more I looked at this, the more it seemed like an archetypal example of the Department of Justice's prosecutorial abuse when it comes to computer crime. It shows how aggressive they are, and how they seek to destroy your reputation in the press even when the charges are complete, fricking garbage."
Duh ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Prosecutors are no longer interested in evenly applying the law in a sane manner.
They're interested in high profile retribution which is intended to send a message which says "don't mess with us, or we'll do this to you".
And, somehow, at the CEO level when there's massive fraud and malfeasance ... absolutely nothing happens.
Because the justice system is dependent on how much money is in your bank account, and who your friends are.
Re:Duh ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Ten years ago I would have said you were a crank. Five years ago I would have ignored the comment. But this country has gone seriously down hill over the past decade and a half.
Corporate fraud and malfeasance is a major issue. Even things corporations do legally should be of paramount concern to the people of the US. There needs to be a disassembly (not continued over-regulation, which are two completely separate things) of the finance structure in the US, starting with the repeal of GLBA and the reinstatement of Glass-Steigel.
Re:Duh ... (Score:4, Funny)
Ten years ago I would have said you were a crank. Five years ago I would have ignored the comment. But this country has gone seriously down hill over the past decade and a half.
Are you sure that the world has changed so much, and it is not just that you understand it better?
Might be time to grow that lawn....
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Funny? No. Insightful. 100%.
Re:Duh ... (Score:5, Insightful)
In all honesty, ten years ago I would have said I'm a crank.
But, the reality is, over the last bunch of years, we're seeing much more "victory at any costs" coming both from the legal system and the politicians. Facts and the law are secondary to agendas and posturing.
We're seeing more and more examples of "the law and your rights are too damned inconvenient so we're going to ignore them".
We see Federal law enforcement lying about their secret spying capacity and going to great lengths to conceal it.
We see those same entities writing a hand book for how to commit perjury to about where they got their evidence in order to get a conviction and gloss over some of the shadier bits about how they operate. Effectively it's a "how to frame someone we believe is guilty but didn't legally obtain the evidence".
The companies who caused the economic meltdown? Bailed out, and forgiven so we don't introduce any more instability, totally ignoring what amounted to billions of dollars worth of Ponzi schemes.
The legal system has been co-opted to serve the interests of commercial entities, who more or less write laws which governments pass for them.
And, increasingly, we see the governments of Western nations getting together to do this shit to all of us.
So, yeah ... not so long ago I would have been a crank. But, not so long ago, none of this stuff was real, it was the stuff of fiction.
I keep saying, what was fantastical fiction 10-15 years ago is commonplace. And if it keeps going that way, we're pretty much fucked.
In my mind, we've pretty much reached the point where the surveillance state being in partnership with (and in some cases working for) an oligarchy or corporations who don't give a shit about anything but their own profits, and who have the means to change and control anything which they find inconvenient.
It doesn't seem like there's enough tinfoil on the entire fucking planet to NOT end up sounding like a paranoid loon when you look at what's actually happening.
I'd like to go back to a nice normal "slightly crazy" like before. But the world doesn't seem like it's trending in that direction.
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I think you can pin it down even more accurately to on or about September 12, 2001, when the American public collectively lost their critical thinking skills and bought into practically everything the government told them.
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You really don't want the reinstatement of Glass-Steigel. What you want is an updated version. The nice thing is Elizabeth Warren wrote it 21st Century Glass–Steagall Act (S.1282).
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Ten years ago I would have said you were a crank. Five years ago I would have ignored the comment. But this country has gone seriously down hill over the past decade and a half.
Corporate fraud and malfeasance is a major issue. Even things corporations do legally should be of paramount concern to the people of the US. There needs to be a disassembly (not continued over-regulation, which are two completely separate things) of the finance structure in the US, starting with the repeal of GLBA and the reinstatement of Glass-Steigel.
10 years ago, I knew the system was fucked. But it's nice that the general consensus is coming around to agree with me, more or less. It reminds me of when everyone else finally realized what a terrible president Gorge W. Bush was, or that the NSA really is spying on them.
The problems go deeper than you probably know; deep enough that you would again consider me a crank if I told you. The fraud and regulatory capture are only the beginning. Where it gets really interesting is where the corporate and fin
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Nope, this hasn't changed. Read up on the Neidorf E911 case.
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Because this lets the prosecutor appear "tough on crime" which plays well when he tries to advance his political career.
Because that CEO is also a major campaign contributor.
It's sad how much of this goes back to politics.
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It would be more accurate to say: it all goes back to money.
Politics is the means by which certain individuals get elected, and how others get appointed by the elected officials. Which is legislation favorable to a particular industry gets passed, and how lucrative government defense contracts get awarded. In exchange for which, the political figure in question can be assured of a nice corporate consulting or board position upon retirement. At which point they become a campaign contributor, and the whole
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Pretty much.
Just remember, if the government has the power to do anything you want, it also has the power to do anything that guy over there wants.
His best interests aren't necessarily your best interests. And he may have more money to buy legislation than you do.
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Prosecutors are no longer interested in evenly applying the law in a sane manner.
They're interested in high profile retribution which is intended to send a message which says "don't mess with us, or we'll do this to you".
And, somehow, at the CEO level when there's massive fraud and malfeasance ... absolutely nothing happens.
Because the justice system is dependent on how much money is in your bank account, and who your friends are.
Or if you're a member of "team us" with the prosecutor you don't have to worry, either. Look at cases where police officers actually are indicted for a crime and see how the prosecution is handled. A couple of names to google: "Jon Burge", "Johannes Meserle", "David Bisard". Note the charges - absolutely the minimum. Take a look at what happens when police officers falsify reports and such, too. It's crazy.
The justice system is mainly made to screw over poor people. The middle class are simply bankrup
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There's more truth to that than you might realize:
The people who have been setting government economic policy for the last two decades are usually drawn from the financial industry which almost destroyed the global economy.
So, the lying, cheating bastards who got us into this
Need automatic "loser pays" in jurisprudence (Score:5, Insightful)
They wouldn't be doing it, if they — the prosecuting agency(ies) — faced non-trivial monetary loss for every charge, that did not hold up in court...
To keep it harder for entities — both private and governmental — with large legal budgets to initiate frivolous proceedings, the loser must pay winner. There is no such thing currently and even winning a suit can leave one with thousands of dollars in debt. It must become automatic and not require a separate lawsuit by the winner to recoup his legal costs.
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You can lose even with a case with merit. The law is not oriented so as to preclude you from engaging in a suit entirely out of the fear you might, from a technicality, be found to have your suit not substantiated.
Yes, the law may not award costs and punitive damages for prosecutorial aggressiveness, but it serves other ends. Perhaps that issue is meant to be dealt with by other means?
In the US, don't you elect prosecutors, judges, and sherrifs, and DAs, and so on? These people, one presumes, are doing as t
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You might. And my system will help further discourage you from making a nuisance of yourself.
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One caveat: The legal fees should be capped, not set to all legal fees. Otherwise, small guy sues big company. Small guy stretches his budget and pays $10,000 in legal fees. Big company's legal budget is $10 million. Big company wins and now small guy is on the hook for $10 million. With this situation, the possibility of losing and needing to pay Big Company's legal fees will become an incentive not to sue big companies.
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Criminal case, not civil cases from what I can gather.
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Maybe.
If the target of the lawsuit (your hypothetical company) was forced to spend $10 million to defend itself, then, yes, $10 million it will be. Unless, maybe, the judge will tell them, they didn't need to feed 10 lawyers black caviar. But it is entirely possible that the parties' legal costs will be in different orders of magnitude — that may still be perfectly le
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One caveat: The legal fees should be capped, not set to all legal fees. Otherwise, small guy sues big company. Small guy stretches his budget and pays $10,000 in legal fees. Big company's legal budget is $10 million. Big company wins and now small guy is on the hook for $10 million. With this situation, the possibility of losing and needing to pay Big Company's legal fees will become an incentive not to sue big companies.
German rules: Small guy asks for X dollars. Big company offers Y dollars (Y may be zero). Judge notes that they argue about X - Y dollars. Judge takes out a table which says what the court and what each side's lawyers can charge for a case over that amount. (If X - Y is very small or zero, the judge will refuse to hear it).
When the case is finished, judge decides that Big company must pay Z dollars, Z between Y and X. Then cost is apportioned to Small Guy and Big Company. Portion of Big Company is (Z - Y
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I think a potential solution is to have the court mediate costs.
There is a lawsuit. The court evaluates the size of the claims, and determines what a reasonable total legal expenditure is for a case of that size. Obviously a billion dollar patent lawsuit will involve more legal fees than a $100 bent fender dispute. The court then divides that amount in two and allocates half for each party.
The two parties then can select lawyers who bill their services to the court. It would be illegal for any lawyer to
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Small guy can't pay $10m and goes bankrupt. That seems fair. He has to gamble.
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They wouldn't be doing it, if they — the prosecuting agency(ies) — faced non-trivial monetary loss for every charge, that did not hold up in court...
How would that make a difference? They're the government. They *are* all the money, right?
And if they don't have the money now, can't they can just raise taxes during the next budget cycle to cover those costs?
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The government does have unlimited pockets, but the budgets of individual prosecuting agencies is limited...
It would still force prosecutors to be more restrained. If, for example, we paid $10K for each alleged felony and $5K for each misdemeanor, the guy in TFA would've been due $440K. Well, maybe, $
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They wouldn't be doing it, if they — the prosecuting agency(ies) — faced non-trivial monetary loss for every charge, that did not hold up in court...
To keep it harder for entities — both private and governmental — with large legal budgets to initiate frivolous proceedings, the loser must pay winner. There is no such thing currently and even winning a suit can leave one with thousands of dollars in debt. It must become automatic and not require a separate lawsuit by the winner to recoup his legal costs.
My best friend is a lawyer (we both live in the USA - don't know where you live off hand and I'm too lazy to check your profile) and we've talked about this very issue, but what you propose is DOA in the USA for a variety of reasons. Lawyers absolutely hate this idea. The standard lawyer response is "But with that kind of risk, people with legitimate grievances will simply not sue rather than risk losing". Of course fewer law suits is not good for lawyers. Most legislators at the state and national leve
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doesnt solve the problem, just shifts the side where teh abuse sits.
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They can already do that, so we would not be any worse off. My proposal would not seriously help those with large legal budgets — but it will help those with small ones.
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No. The change I propose would discourage big (guys or companies) from going after small (guys or companies) frivolously — when they don't care whether they win or lose, they just want the small to fold for fear of legal costs regardless of outcome. With my system, if you are sure of being right, you don't need to fear ruin upon winning.
What "screwed over
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You're assuming that the judge and jury got the right answer and weren't bamboozled by an expensive and slick advertising^Wlegal team. Which of course is the hoped-for outcome... but not one that many folks have a lot of faith in nowadays.
Having worked with prosecutors (Score:3)
Re:Having worked with prosecutors (Score:4, Insightful)
Funny until you're the defendant
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It's actually funny.
It might be funny... It's certainly not justice.
I don't get why you elect judges and prosecutors mixing politics into the justice system. It makes the whole thing so adversarial.
When it should be about truth and not convictions...
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We do call it the adversarial system for a reason. It's not only the defendant who is adversarial; it's also the prosecution.
Wired article is biased (Score:2, Informative)
Remember, haxx0rz rule at Wired.
This is from rt.com (English-language Russian news); it explains where the $10,000 figure came from, and sheds light on what the Wired story claimed was Salinas merely logging in an filling in a couple online forms with garbage text:
According to Special Agent Nguyen, authorities narrowed in on their target that January after investigators linked an attempt to breach the site of Hidalgo County with a computer within a residence where Salinas was staying. Salinas “made over 14,000 attempts to log into their website server,” Nguyen charged, in turn slowing down the system for administrators and visitors alike and eventually requiring the county to hire tech specialists. In all, the hack is alleged to have cost Hidalgo County $10,620.32, according to the Sept. 2013 complaint.
Nguyen said the IP address of the computer used by Salinas was responsible for those thousands of attempted intrusions, and a search warrant executed a week after the hack occurred ended with the FBI seizing his laptops and recovering forensic evidence that linked him to the attacks.
Salinas was interviewed by FBI Special Agent Christopher Wallingsford several months later in September 2012 and admitted during that meeting and at a later one that he used a program on his computer to attempt to gain administrative access to the site, but that his efforts were to test the network’s security.
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What kind of computer system does Hidalgo county have that 14,000 login attempts would even register as a blip on the CPU?
That doesn't really matter, does it? 14,000 login attempts by one user in one or two days is an unreasonably high number. It was an attempt to create mischief. While it is probably possible to design a system so that 14,000 login attempts cause no problem, Hidalgo county had no obligation to do this.
It's also possible that there were _only_ 14,000 login attempts because the login attempts were done as quickly as the attacked system allowed it, and if Hidalgo's system had been ten times more efficient, th
And most likely even the misdemeanor is garbage (Score:3, Interesting)
But would YOU want to have a judge who can't operate his cellphone without an accident judge you on the base of laws written by people who don't have much more of a clue concerning the matter in a case where exactly these things play a key role? Supported by 12 douches whose primary concern is to get out of the whole mess as quickly as possible, no matter how.
You sure as hell take the deal, knowing that you have NO chance in hell to a fair trial.
Spaghetti prosecution. (Score:2)
Throw a bunch of stuff on the wall and hope something sticks. Prosecutors don't really care what that is as long as it's something and they "win".
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Outlawing plea deals should be a national priority (Score:3)
When the word plea bargain is spoken all I hear is "forced confession" in keeping with traditions of the worlds leading jailor the United States of North Korea.
People should simply be charged with whatever the crime they are accused of committing... It just isn't the act of using coercion to force a desired outcome alone it is all the second order effects this practice asserts on the whole system turning everything to shit.
Maximum sentences are allowed to pierce the stratosphere because nobody notices when insane sentences are merely threatened but not actually handed out.
Laws are intentionally written in broad terms to be used as a weapon yet again nobody cares because it does not happen.
And before you know it in all ways that matter we are back to kings jailing the peasant fools they happen to dislike.
Every dog is entitled to one bite. (Score:2)
The consequences which follow from a $10,000 fine and a guilty plea to a federal misdemeanor hacking charge are not trivial.
His usefulness to Anonymous is at an end --- the collective will be wondering about how much he had to offer in exchange for a plea bargain.
Pleading down to a misdemeanor is common enough for a first offender. But that is a card you can play only once.
No trials (Score:2)
Federal Sentencing Guidelines (Score:3, Interesting)
If the charges stuck, the man was facing multiple lifetimes worth of imprisonment.
Bull****. Federal sentencing guidelines almost never ask for "fully stacked" sentences. Instead, you wind up with X months for the "top count" and a significant "discount" of additional time for each additional count that is either proven or conceded. For a single count, the maximum sentence is almost never handed out unless there are other factors in play. So let's say this guy did admit to all 44 charges and accept a guilty plea on all 44 counts, and that there were no other factors that counted for or against him under the sentencing guidelines. The guidelines would probably recommend that he get a few years for the first count, a year or two more for each of counts 2 and 3, and a month or two for each additional count, likely resulting in a sentence in the 10-15 year range.
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How is it reasonable that the same crime could carry a punishment ranging from 2 to 10 years? I understand variance due to circumstances, but that range seems ripe for abuse.
Pouring motor oil into a lake: Could be 1/4 litre, could be 10,000 litres. There should be a huge range for the "same" crime. Assault: The victim might say "ouch", or the victim might be disfigured and in a wheelchair for the rest of their life. There should be a huge range. Murder: Probably much less variation.
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The term you're looking for is "consecutively." Most of the time, all sentences are served "concurrently," or at the same time. On rare occasions, as you write, a judge will specify that the sentences be served consecutively, to keep an exceptionally bad felon behind bars for as long as possible. Of course, the prosecutor can always threaten to ask for consecutive sentences to bulldoze the defendant into accepting a plea.
Re:He still plead guilty to something ... (Score:4, Insightful)
This. The "throw everything at the wall and see what sticks so we can negotiate a plea bargain to avoid a real trial" methods of prosecutors in what passes for the modern criminal justice system is just sickening.
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So, systemically, how do you combat that? I'm on board with supporting reform, but complaining isn't the same as reform.
Keep in mind actively punish prosecutors for procedural violations won't happen for political reasons.
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I don't know if I buy that prosecutors throw *everything* they can at you. I was charged with shoplifting once, and I didn't even get a public defender. Instead had to argue my case with the prosecutor directly, and she herself filed a motion to dismiss, which the judge approved. She said her goal was justice.
Just prior to that (I had to sit in the court room and watch her and other prosecutors argue their case against other defendants until it was my turn) I watched her tell the judge that she wasn't offer
Re:He still plead guilty to something ... (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't know if I buy that prosecutors throw *everything* they can at you. I was charged with shoplifting once, and I didn't even get a public defender. Instead had to argue my case with the prosecutor directly, and she herself filed a motion to dismiss, which the judge approved. She said her goal was justice.
Just prior to that (I had to sit in the court room and watch her and other prosecutors argue their case against other defendants until it was my turn) I watched her tell the judge that she wasn't offering any kind of plea deal against the previous defendant and that she wanted to go to trial with him, which I'm guessing in his case she had some pretty clear cut evidence for conviction.
(I went home very relieved that day as I had just gotten done watching the BOOK getting THROWN at people by the judge for similar crimes just prior to the judge smiling at me and telling me my case had been dismissed and I may leave.)
I have been arrested mainly times in my life. I was a no good junkie who supported my habit by shoplifting. During my stupid 15 year drug addiction, I've gotten in to a lot of scrapes legally, some of which I wasn't guilty of, just at the wrong place at the wrong time. Most the shit I was guilty of.
The problem? Because I could no afford to pay bail, or get a decent lawyer, I was always stuck with public defenders. During probably 20 court trials, I have had only 1 good public defender that actually tried to get shit done, rest the time, they didn't give a fuck. And because I didn't want to stay in jail till trial (which would of been at least 6 months of jail time), I'd take guilty pleas so I'd end up staying in jail a week or so.
TL;DR I did bad shit, I went to jail for it. Because I was poor and couldn't ever bail out, I would of spent years in jail waiting on trials for crimes that don't ever carry more then a month in jail. So I plea bargained because otherwise I'd spend more time in jail trying to prove my freedom, then actually taking the guilty plea and time served.
Fucked up system.
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That's a good point. If the crime you're charged with carries a maximum month sentence, you should be out on bail after the month automatically.
I'm also glad to hear that you've turned your life around. Well done, sir.
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Bail? If you've been in jail for a month, you've served the sentence already, deservedly so or not, so what is the bail for?
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If you're still in jail after a month waiting for trial on a charge that only carries a 30 day sentence, you've got a good argument for a Sixth Amendment civil rights case IMO.
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You gotta elect people who will rewrite the law. Or you can call a constitutional convention. Either way, it's pretty straight up. If you vote for garbage, don't complain when you get garbage, and especially when you all reuse the same garbage for 20-30 years in some cases. And please, save me all the bullshit about money. Just tune it out.
Now, since we are dealing with a vast majority(98% at present) who will dance to anything, maybe it's time to consider alternatives to majority rule. Some sort of lottery
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Well, sure, there are plenty of public servants who are motivated by a desire to, you know, serve the public, but they don't make headlines or get famous so you don't hear about them much. They could very well be (and probably do) constitute the vast majority.
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Whoops, that was supposed to be in reply to the comment above [slashdot.org].
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Well, sure, there are plenty of public servants who are motivated by a desire to, you know, serve the public, but they don't make headlines or get famous so you don't hear about them much.
True... I suspect the only reason a governor like Chris Christie is even being talked about with respect to 2016 is because he is in the media.
Granted I don't follow American politics closely, but it seems to me he is only in the media because he is borderline crazy...
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Thus making lobbyists more powerful, since they are now dealing with amateurs. Amateurs who's lives have been interrupted, and who are thus in desperate need of future financial security. Sounds like a good plan.
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Some sort of lottery system that would make political campaigns and party affiliations obsolete, and put an end to the career in public service.
Thus making lobbyists more powerful, since they are now dealing with amateurs. Amateurs who's lives have been interrupted, and who are thus in desperate need of future financial security. Sounds like a good plan.
We do it to decide life-and-death issues - it's called the jury system. Works pretty well most of the time, too.
Re:He still plead guilty to something ... (Score:5, Interesting)
How about not allowing prosecutors to change the charge depending on the plea bargain?
If the prosecutor thinks a person is guilty of X, don't allow them to accept a plea for Y. The most they should be able to offer is a recommendation to the judge of non-maximum sentence.
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This is the kind of thing I like to get out of these conversations. This could work at solving the problem, now all we need is a large political apparatus to push it.
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That systems exists in a lot of European courts. It is very bad because in that situation the defendant almost never has a reason to cooperate. At best they plead no contest. Since you never get a full confession you have no check on whether people did the crime.
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Whereas in the American system, the accused has an incentive to provide a false confession.
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I'd agree. Good point. Perhaps the best thing would be the American system plus a lengthy detailed confession requirement.
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Well Germans do like the rules. :) There are ways of corrupting any system, nothing is full proof. We hope for better not perfect.
Re:He still plead guilty to something ... (Score:4, Informative)
That systems exists in a lot of European courts. It is very bad because in that situation the defendant almost never has a reason to cooperate. At best they plead no contest. Since you never get a full confession you have no check on whether people did the crime.
But in the current US system you get confessions in about 10% of the cases where we know that people were actually innocent (the innocence project tracks this).
We don't have plea bargains in Sweden and on balance I can't say I look forward to having them. If they were ever introduced I think they should be capped at (say) max 10% or 15% or some such. I.e. none of that "I'm seeking 99 years in prison, but I'll settle for six months" as is currently not uncommon with US prosecutors. By stopping the prosecutor from lowering the sought penalty more than a reasonable percentage, you could balance the system to where it would be both worth to cooperate, but also not possible for the prosecutor to extort the defendant by skewing the risk/reward calculation to the extent that is common today.
P.S. And of course, in Sweden, if the state prosecutes you, they pay for your defence (i.e. the lawyer of your choice, reimbursed at a proper rate), and prosecutors are appointed, not elected. Last place I want a bloody politician...
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That's a good solution potentially.
So say we cap it at a 50% reduction. How can you enforce that?
Prosecutor changes X with crimes A carrying L years, B carrying M years and C carrying N years. With L M,N. He decides that X is not guilty of B and C and drops the charges. How is that prevented?
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That should be L < M,N. Didn't realize I had to use HTML there. Sorry.
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I like (a) for both our civil and our criminal system.
(b) can be circumvented easily. I charge X with 20 counts of A carry a sentence of X and 1 count of B carrying a sentence of Y. Say X < 1% of Y. So that doesn't fix the problem.
c) I like as well a lot regardless of this other issue.
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The defendant should not have a reason at all to cooperate and should be allowed to remain silent. It's the duty of the prosecutors to prove the crime, and if they have no solid evidence to start with then the case should never have gone to court.
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This would need to apply to law enforcement and the prosecution as well. Not going to happen here.
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The right against self incrimination is a protection against torture and coercion. It works against justice and due process because those are seen as greater evils.
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But there would still be a reason to cooperate. If the punishment for the crime is X to Y years, confessing would make it more likely that it would just be X. So in cases where evidence is strong, the public will likely be spared the cost of a trial and the criminal would still 'profit' by confessing. But a guilty person couldn't be forced into 'accepting' a sentence of X just to avoid being charged with crimes totaling 1000X.
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The problem is building a strong case is part of what the system wants to avoid doing. They want to make it expensive for the guilty to find out if the eventual evidence is going to be strong. So what is the ratio of X to Y? Unless that ratio is large it may always pays for a defendant to take their chances until at least late in the process.
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Since a confession doesn't mean the person did the crime, and pleading innocence also doesn't prove said innocence, I really don't see how confession has any value whatsoever. You either can prove beyond reasonable doubt that they did it, or you can not. And while a confession including, say, the hiding place of the body has some weight to it, this weight is no more so than would demonstrating the suspect has knowledge
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No defendant ever pleads innocence, and I don't think that such a plea is even allowed. The plea is "not guilty," and for good reason: in order to avoid conviction with a plea of innocent, you'd have to prove that you didn't commit the crime, and it's exceptionally hard in most cases to prove a negative. "Not guilty" is used instead because you only have to persuade the jury that there's a reasonable chance that you are not, in fact, guilty. An
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There is a pretty strong correlation between pleas and guilt. Not perfect but not worthless either. Increasing that correlation is the goal.
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There is absolutely no way of determining that under a system where pleading out offers less of a downside than going to trial. And that is not only the case in the US justice system, the benefits usually swing so hard towards the "you'd be better off with a plea" side of the scale that you'd have to be batshit insane to go to trial. The monetary, time, future employme
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Yo that's a pretty solid idea.
Prosecutors decide what crime you violated, and then after that their hands are tied. If they can't nail you for that then their options are exhausted. This would have good and bad effects but maybe the good would be the greater portion. I'd have to think about it but it's at least a pretty good idea.
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In a democracy (or representative republic), ultimately the buck stops with the voters. Prosecutors aren't kings, they answer to somebody who answers to somebody (who answers to somebody...) who answers to you, the voter.
Find out who in your municipality or jurisdiction has to power to appoint or censure prosecutors, and if they're doing a bad job, then complain, vote against them, start a public campaign; hell, run for office yourself if you have to.
The American system of government requires a populace th
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The easiest way to combat prosecutorial abuse would be:
Providing for compensation for charges being lost in court. Something like a 1/3rd rule, that is someone disproves 1/3rd of the charges against them the rest are dismissed by the judge. Create a penalty for overcharging.
Less drastic. Strengthening the grand jury system to make it more like an inquisitorial system trial ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I... [wikipedia.org] ). Good quality analysis so that indictments represent the community and not just prosecutors ga
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Make plea bargaining illegal. What's gained by it?
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Cases going through the court system faster, due to guilty pleas.
Which I suspect isn't worth it since that it results in guilty people getting lighter charges and innocent people pleading guilty to avoid the chance long jail terms (we all know innocent people get convicted - that people are later exonerated is proof of that).
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It's not just the chance of long jail terms: benefits of pleading out can include huge financial benefits (trials are extremely expensive), huge time benefits (trials take a long time during which uncertainty and pre-trial restrictions take a very real toll), may pose the difference between not just guilt, but they type of guilt -- felony or misdemeanor, conviction or adjudication withheld, witness activity or fines or restitution instead of part or all of a jail term -- but yes, on top of all that, you kno
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All of this assumes very deep pockets in terms of available time and funds. In other words, this generally is not even remotely a practical option.
Re:He still plead guilty to something ... (Score:4, Insightful)
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This. The "throw everything at the wall and see what sticks so we can negotiate a plea bargain to avoid a real trial" methods of prosecutors in what passes for the modern criminal justice system is just sickening.
I agree. It makes me wonder. If they threaten you with thousands of years of imprisonment and millions in fines and you plead guilty to some small violation that you didn't do in order to avoid the possibility of all that punishment for the other crimes you didn't commit, can they then bring you up on charges of perjury for lying in court and saying you committed a crime when you did not?
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Yes. Not only that they can bring the prosecutor up for pressuring you to perjure yourself if your confession was clearly false to a reasonable person of his skill.
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Like THAT would ever happen.
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It doesn't happen often but Claude Stuart, Queens assistant district attorney just got moderately punished for it.
Doesn't matter (Score:2)
It counts as a "win" and his percentage goes up.
Re:Junk Article? (Score:5, Informative)
*sigh* as always, we have this and that said, no citation. Anyone got a LINK to what he actually DID (excuse me, what he was accused of specifically)
Not sure of full details, but I got this much:
18 counts of cyberstalking: filling out a public contact form on the "victim's" website with junk text.
15 counts violating Computer Fraud and Abuse Act: scanning sites for vulnerabilities using commercial available scanning tools.
Not sure what the other 11 counts were.
The only charge he pled guilty to was a violation of the CFAA, downgraded to a misdemeanor, for trying to log in to the Hidalgo County website server 14,000 times, causing a slowdown that prompted them to hire specialists.
Re:Junk Article? (Score:4, Insightful)
Remind me to stay the hell out of that area. I'm a serial criminal according to that fucked up legal system.
A career criminal and a member (actually one of the kingpins) of an international professional crime syndicate.
Expatriate woes (Score:2)
You think? So you haven't had the appropriate discussion with a tax professional familiar with expatriate situations, then. You're in for one seriously depressing conversation. Some locations are worse than others due to local issues in the country of desired residence (the UK is one of these, for instance... your in-country tax load would be very high, starting with VAT and petrol and employment of UK+US tax specialists and going downhill f
Re:The charges are complete garbage (Score:5, Insightful)
That's the whole point in throwing the boko at someone and then extracting a plea deal.
To get you to admit guilt, even if there is none, to aoid the possibility of spending a lifetime behind bars if you should lose an actual court case.
Our jails arent overstuffed because of trials and convictions, but because of plea deals.
Garbage In, Garbage Out; Treasure In... (Score:2)
That's the whole point in throwing the book at someone and then extracting a plea deal.
Without plea deals the system would grind to a halt.
Without criminalizing forms of speech the system would be freer to deal with actual crime. The legitimate powers of government reach actions only, not opinions. [loc.gov]
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Well, without a trial, how do you know they are guilty?
They admit guilt, because the punishment for the trumped up charges is so out of relation to the crime that happened for real. (Which does not mean that the defendant did the crime, or even a real crime happened, it's just the "visibile" thing) Now we've already concluded that many people take the plea deal to avoid that risk. (Hint: Because of minimum sentencing standards yet another safety valve has been disabled, e.g. the judge sentencing you for a d