Serial Swatter Who Caused Death Gets Five Years In Prison (krebsonsecurity.com) 186
A 18-year-old Tennessee man who helped set in motion a fraudulent distress call to police that lead to the death of a 60-year-old grandfather in 2020 was sentenced to 60 months in prison today. Krebs on Security reports: Shane Sonderman, of Lauderdale County, Tenn. admitted to conspiring with a group of criminals that's been "swatting" and harassing people for months in a bid to coerce targets into giving up their valuable Twitter and Instagram usernames. At Sonderman's sentencing hearing today, prosecutors told the court the defendant and his co-conspirators would text and call targets and their families, posting their personal information online and sending them pizzas and other deliveries of food as a harassment technique.
Other victims of the group told prosecutors their tormentors further harassed them by making false reports of child abuse to social services local to the target's area, and false reports in the target's name to local suicide prevention hotlines. Eventually, when subjects of their harassment refused to sell or give up their Twitter and Instagram usernames, Sonderman and others would swat their targets -- or make a false report to authorities in the target's name with the intention of sending a heavily armed police response to that person's address. [...]
Sonderman might have been eligible to knock a few months off his sentence had he cooperated with investigators and refrained from committing further crimes while out on bond. But prosecutors said that shortly after his release, Sonderman went right back to doing what he was doing when he got caught. Investigators who subpoenaed his online communications found he'd logged into the Instagram account "FreeTheSoldiers," which was known to have been used by the group to harass people for their social media handles. Sonderman was promptly re-arrested for violating the terms of his release, and prosecutors played for the court today a recording of a phone call Sonderman made from jail in which he brags to a female acquaintance that he wiped his mobile phone two days before investigators served another search warrant on his home. "Although it may seem inadequate, the law is the law," said Judge Norris after giving Sonderman the maximum sentence allowed by law under the statute. "The harm it caused, the death and destruction... it's almost unspeakable. This is not like cases we frequently have that involve guns and carjacking and drugs. This is a whole different level of insidious criminal behavior here."
Other victims of the group told prosecutors their tormentors further harassed them by making false reports of child abuse to social services local to the target's area, and false reports in the target's name to local suicide prevention hotlines. Eventually, when subjects of their harassment refused to sell or give up their Twitter and Instagram usernames, Sonderman and others would swat their targets -- or make a false report to authorities in the target's name with the intention of sending a heavily armed police response to that person's address. [...]
Sonderman might have been eligible to knock a few months off his sentence had he cooperated with investigators and refrained from committing further crimes while out on bond. But prosecutors said that shortly after his release, Sonderman went right back to doing what he was doing when he got caught. Investigators who subpoenaed his online communications found he'd logged into the Instagram account "FreeTheSoldiers," which was known to have been used by the group to harass people for their social media handles. Sonderman was promptly re-arrested for violating the terms of his release, and prosecutors played for the court today a recording of a phone call Sonderman made from jail in which he brags to a female acquaintance that he wiped his mobile phone two days before investigators served another search warrant on his home. "Although it may seem inadequate, the law is the law," said Judge Norris after giving Sonderman the maximum sentence allowed by law under the statute. "The harm it caused, the death and destruction... it's almost unspeakable. This is not like cases we frequently have that involve guns and carjacking and drugs. This is a whole different level of insidious criminal behavior here."
inadequate sentence (Score:5, Insightful)
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Or a family member of a victim turns out to be the wrong kind of person to make angry.
Re:inadequate sentence (Score:4, Insightful)
Or the grieving human-mountain of a cousin of the victim happens to be in the same cell block serving a life sentence with nothing to lose by adding a prison shanking to the list of crimes.
I once worked wit a guy, oh ten-15 years ago, who was involved in hacking domain name registers and managed to get his hands about 500,000 credit card details, then tried to sell it to an under cover cop. He did 12 months for it, and at the end was utterly terrified of ever going back.
Prison, filled with hardened violent people with antisocial behavior disorders is a very very bad place for a nerd to find himself caged.
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At five years, the guy is going to go to a minimum to low security joint unless he royally pissed off the BOP (which is almost impossible because there are no police hurt.) This means he sleeps in a dorm room, at most, there may be a locked door between the prisoners and the exit (heck, some min joints don't even have that, as the fear of an escape charge is good enough to keep someone from walking off). At most, he winds up in a pod for sleeping, and goes off to his job all day, so he can stock up on sou
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This guy didn't take a gun to an innocent person's house and point it at him. Nor did he demand the police shoot a man. The police are an accessory to this crime and they get away, free.
"... the law is the law," said Judge Norris ...
'Tough on criminals' doesn't work when the police are accessories to the crime. It doesn't work when the law focuses on money and violence.
Re:inadequate sentence (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:inadequate sentence (Score:5, Informative)
The felony murder [slashdot.org] rule typically only applies for specific felonies -- either ones that are considered inherently dangerous, or are listed in statutes, or where the felon did something inherently dangerous to human life during the course of the felony. Unfortunately, I don't think that swatting would trigger any of those criteria. (Additionally, four states do not have any version of the felony murder doctrine.)
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Correct link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re:inadequate sentence (Score:5, Insightful)
It may be time to review this, swatting IS is inherently dangerous. You're sending a bunch of people with guns in after convincing them it's a high tension situation.
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Shoot first, ask questions later (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, SWATing is bad.
But it was the police that did the actual killing. And that is not uncommon. That is the problem.
Re:Shoot first, ask questions later (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree that it's a problem, but there's plenty of blame to go around. The swatter is not an innocent bystander in the deaths.
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I dont think anyone disagrees with that. SWAT type police operations have a horrendous problem with killing or injuring people whos behaviours dont necessary meet the threshold fr which thats a valid response.
However, because everybody knows that, bamboozling swat cops into behaving that way is a behavior where theres at least some foreknowledge that this could end up fatal. Its not the same as a mob boss saying "Kill that Putz who just muscled into our turf", but it might well be the same as a mob boss say
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Only in USA. You need militarized police to have swating. There is no swating in Europe.
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Requesting further explanation of this. In the UK it would be murder. The guy knew that SWATing was likely to result in injury or death so it's pre-meditated murder.
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So the UK minor who actually made the call to the police in this case is being prosecuted for murder?
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That's an interesting question. There are slightly different rules with minors depending on how old they are, but if they were say 16 or 17 then murder is certainly possible.
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Sure, SWATing is bad.
But it was the police that did the actual killing. And that is not uncommon. That is the problem.
It's not a zero sum game... What makes either party less guilty.
The SWATer knows they're doing wrong, the SWAT team should know to check their targets and not shot anything that moves.
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There are two forms of the felony murder doctrine practiced in the United States. The first uses a "dangerous felony" approach, which relies upon felonies which are thought to be dangerous listed in the felony-murder statute and if the defendant commits one of those felonies, it triggers the rule.[6] The other form requires that the defendant commit an act clearly dangerous to human life while committing a felony and does not rely on any enumerated felonies in a statute.[6]
If you think swatting someone isn't dangerous you are a retard.
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And maybe you should read the part of my comment that mentioned that. Police aren't supposed to shoot someone during a 911 response. The difficulty in sticking swatters with charges that carry long prison terms is very much the point of the quote (from the presiding judge) at the end of TFS.
Do you have any case law, or even an indictment or charging information, that supports your hypothesis that swatting counts as "an act clearly dangerous to human life"? Or, hell, even an actual lawyer's blog somewhere
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Police aren't supposed to shoot someone during a 911 response.
Nobody was shot. The person died from a heart attack.
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Of course swatting is dangerous, just like setting a rabid dog on someone is dangerous.
If you set a rabid dog on someone, you go to prison and the dog is put down. Why on earth are the police treated as less responsible than a rabid dog? They are equally culpable.
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That's the opposite of a sane law.
Police guilty? (Score:4, Insightful)
This guy didn't take a gun to an innocent person's house and point it at him. Nor did he demand the police shoot a man. The police are an accessory to this crime and they get away, free.
So, let's say somebody pranks a pizza delivery place and gets a dozen pizzas fraudulently delivered to a house, payment due. Is the delivery driver guilty of a crime?
I will agree that our police need to tone it down several notches, but the swatter deliberately arranged things to have the police as high strung as possible.
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Your pizza guy analogy would only be valid if, on arrival at the mark's house, he clubbed the guy who answered the door over the head, took his wallet, and stole the cash or credit card for the pizza. A proper analogy would be the hiring of an assassin.
If I decide I hate someone enough that I want them dead, and I pay a hitman to kill him, said hitman is not really just an FBI plant pretending to be a hitman online, and the hit is successful; then I goto prison. And it is entirely proper that I do go away
Re:Police guilty? (Score:4, Funny)
Your pizza guy analogy would only be valid if, on arrival at the mark's house, he clubbed the guy who answered the door over the head, took his wallet, and stole the cash or credit card for the pizza.
Domino's banned that practice years ago ... :-)
Difficulty understanding analogies (Score:2)
You're committing a common mistake; analogies do not need to be identical. It's just a comparison on a single point.
In addition your scenario results in everybody involved being arrested and charged with crimes. Let's look:
the moment you "pay a hitman", both you and the hitman(unless they're a police plant or such) are guilty of multiple felonies. Conspiracy to commit murder, attempted murder on your part(and their part), racketeering, etc...
That said, the police in this case are NOT hitmen. They're peo
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Did you just compare killing an innocent person to PRANKING THE FUCKING PIZZAMAN!?
Yes, yes I did (Score:2)
Why yes, I did do that.
Well, more accurately, I made a analogy, comparing a specific aspect. Of course, total situation wise, SWATing is a lot more serious than pranking the pizzaman(and the address that had the fake pizza order made). But the analogy still holds. The police in this were "innocent" actors, pushed into an extreme action by the false presentation of a presumed emergency.
Now, yes, 99 times out of 100, it would end without anybody being shot, but, well, this was the unlucky time.
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This is why people say defund the police. If they didn't have SWAT gear they would be forced to use other methods to resolve the situation. Methods they should use anyway, but don't because hey the SWAT gear is right there and they love LARPing as tough guys.
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Re: Police guilty? (Score:2)
So, let's say somebody pranks a pizza delivery place...
Essentially, that should be on the pizza delivery place. The resident can claim "I didn't order anything" and not pay. Next it should up to the pizza place to prove that yes, he did, and go after him in a civil lawsuit; or suck it up and accept the damage for being gullible enough and accepting an order and going into advance fulfillment without any form of advance payment, identification or authentication from the would-be customer.
So in your analogy, it's on the police. If you're going to show up at someo
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The police are an accessory to this crime and they get away, free.
Not sure if you RTFA but the victim died of a heart attack, not from an officer's lethal force like in other famous cases.
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Just because there's some serious issues with the police that need to be worked out, doesn't mean that "swatting" shouldn't have some hard deterrent.
In fact people who live in such a system ought to know how police is going to react ought to have known that the consequences of this are potentially lethal.
Hence "swatting" is pretty much like hiring some thugs to rough someone up, not specifying what they should do to a group known to kill their targets now and then.
And that's how the law ought t
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This guy didn't take a gun to an innocent person's house and point it at him.
In effect, he did, and he got the desired result.
People engaging in swatting are doing it specifically because they know the police act beyond their mandates and murder people regularly. The people who don't know that aren't swatting.
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This person called the police and said that the man who was shot had already shot one person and was threatening to kill others. That is an inherently dangerous situation. The police arrived believing the person had already killed and was going to shoot at them because that is what they were told by this human sized piece of shit.
I am pretty sure you are a human sized piece of shit who swatted people in the past because you think the sentence is too light.
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Just lucky for this bastard he hadn't shared an Aerosmith album on Kazaa. They could have really gone after him.
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This guy wasn't smart enough to lay low while he was out on bail pending a trial. No doubt he will try something else once he is out of prison. Or sooner, since it isn't unheard of for incarcerated people to get on line, circumvent monitoring measures and go right on scamming people.
He has a superiority complex. He has to prove himself as being smarter than the cops. Which, on occasion he proves to be (what with being able to swat people). But the cops just need to get smart once to catch him again. He ca
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Really sucks they could only give him 5 years. Hopefully they uncover some other crimes he has committed so that can be lengthened.
Always possible that another inmate could shorten that sentence to a day or two.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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1) I'm not an American.
2) You're defending a murderer.
3) No, the Chinese do not respect human rights, but this is offtopic.
4) You're posting as a coward, seems fitting.
5) This says more about you, that it does me.
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GP is not defending a murderer in any way. GP is pointing out that it's shameful that the US seems to get off on rape in its prisons. How did you get "defending a murderer" from that?
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Hopefully someone with more first hand experience can chime in but I get the impression that a lot of Americans feel that jail should be as degrading and hellish as possible. They resent paying for it too. There is almost no thought given to reducing recidivism.
I also get the impression that these ideas are supported by "tough on crime" politicians and by the prison-industrial complex that needs a constant supply of inmates. That creates a perverse situation where the incentive is to incarcerate as many peo
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This is one reason I don't consider that funny.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Every time the subject of swatting comes up... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's what happens when you have bored militarized (Score:5, Insightful)
police, especially in quiet areas. They shouldn't be given surplus military gear and should be frequently and firmly reminded who it is they're supposed to "protect and serve". The no-knock shit should be 100% illegal.
Re: It's what happens when you have bored militari (Score:3)
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Now, that isn't to say I believe the police are always in the right. I'm just pointing out that they're going to get bad PR either way. That doesn't mean there shouldn't be improvements to the system to help reduce false reports. In this
Re:Every time the subject of swatting comes up... (Score:5, Insightful)
The thing is that American police seem to be very trigger happy. Police show up, the odds are good that someone is going to be shot. Most 1st world countries, that is nowhere near a worry and you have to actually attack the police with a deadly weapon to get shot and even then it is rare. You even have a thing called qualified immunity which basically puts the cops above the law.
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My understanding is that the police basically have to respond to any 911 call. How they act on that response (or any response) is the problem.
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Yes, they basically have to respond.
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No, they are the exact same problem.
The very reason SWATting exists is because the police are a weapon that can be wielded.
The reason the police are a weapon that can be wielded is their immunity to killing people over nothing when there is the most flimsy of excuses present.
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You're even explaining how they are the same problem. The police arriving at a location should not make people's life hell.
The fact that they do is the core problem, and why SWATting even exists.
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The police didn't shoot anyone. You are overreacting.
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This time, and why was the guy so worried that he had a heart attack?
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why was the guy so worried that he had a heart attack?
If you had actually read the article, you wouldn't be so ignorant.
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In the UK the police don't normally carry guns, but they do regularly carry truncheons and now tasers. They also regularly use violence and deploy those weapons against people they really shouldn't use them on. Random people in crowds, people going through mental health crisis etc.
It seems like if you arm police they are going to over-use those weapons. The reluctance of juries to convict the police and the fact that it's usually the police investigating complaints against themselves means that there are ra
Re:Every time the subject of swatting comes up... (Score:5, Insightful)
Part of the problem is the training they receive. Way too many officers get training called Killology. In this, they are told that they are going out to war and everyone they encounter is going to try to kill them. In response, they're told, they need to be ready to end the other person's life at a moment's notice. It makes officers look at every action as if it's an upcoming fatal attack. Old lady you stopped reaching for her purse? She must be trying to grab a gun and shoot you, better shoot her first. Kid playing with a Nerf gun in the park? That must be a real gun in disguise and he'll shoot you with it so he's going down first. Handcuffed suspect isn't complying 100%? He must be trying to figure out how to kill you so you'd better take him out first.
Killology courses should be completely banned and better training courses provided to teach police officers 1) how to deescalate a situation and 2) how to tell the difference between a situation where de-escalation will help and one where they are in actual danger. (I don't deny that officers do encounter "he'll kill me if I don't fire first" situations. The issue is that Killology tells them that EVERY situation is one of these.)
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The thing is that American police seem to be very trigger happy. Police show up, the odds are good that someone is going to be shot.
That is an obvious lie. That you said it shows you are either stupid or a liar. Which is it?
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You just can't "swat" people in other countries, because the police don't shoot first and ask questions later.
Land of the free, baby.
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Too bad. We created thi
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One spoofs the target's phone number or a cell number without E911 capability, dials 911, reports that the target has killed one or two people and that the caller is hiding from the target. Tell the operator that you are at the target's residence and then play some gun sound effects and hang up.
"Oops." (Score:5, Insightful)
The guy got someone killed, and then went right back to doing it. At the very least, charges should be filed on the attempts that came after, because there will be no "I didn't expect it to go that far" defense. Attempted homicide would be an appropriate charge. The public dissatisfaction with the sentencing could be counterbalanced by more consecutive sentences being tacked on.
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I've got to agree. He engaged in an action which resulted in the death of a person. Even if we're being extremely generous and accepted that he didn't realize that swatting could kill a person before, he definitely knew it afterwards. So trying it again is definitely trying to kill someone again. Plus I'm sure there are other charges. He laughed about wiping his phone before investigators could get it. That's destruction of evidence. Normally, I'm not in favor of piling charges on, but in this instance the
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It's almost like this would be the job of our elected representatives, to recognize public anger at the insufficiency of the result and write legislation to fix it?
Or have we completely given up on how the system is supposed to work?
Seems a reasonable sentence to me (Score:4, Informative)
Involuntary Manslaughter is basically when you kill someone because you did not take proper care while committing a crime rather than intentionally murdering him. For example, you tie someone up and gag them while robbing their home and they choke to death.
That is typically less than 2 years.
Voluntary manslaughter - when you get angry and get into a fight and kill someone, even though you never thought about murder, typically gets 3 to 11 years.
Five years seems right to me for his bull.
Keep in mind that a 5 year sentence also destroys his future. This kid will almost certainly not go to college. Imagine if this reckless bastard got a job working for the Sacklers (Opiod manufacterers).
That's felony murder, not involuntary manslaughter (Score:5, Informative)
If you tie somebody up while robbing their home, that's actually felony kidnapping. If they die as a result, that's felony murder, not involuntary manslaughter.
Now, every country and even state in the USA are a bit different, but in the scale:
Involuntary manslaughter
voluntary manslaughter
2nd degree murder
1st degree murder
etc...
"Involuntary manslaughter" tends to come up when you're seriously negligent, but truly didn't mean to kill somebody. You can be hit with it if somebody dies because, for example, you're a repair man and you fail to repair something correctly and somebody dies as a result. If you're driving recklessly and somebody dies. Etc...
Voluntary manslaughter might be a death caused by DUI driving. Deliberate illegal disposal of hazardous waste. That sort of thing. In some states it might be what you're hit with if you make a good, but imperfect self defense case. A raped woman killing her rapist after the fact. "reasonable explanation or excuse; extreme mental or emotional disturbance"
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I think this guy deserves a good 5 long years in prison and a permanent "felon" tag on his record. That sounds about right. But the people calling for his head.... really?
The judge said this guy was somehow as bad as gun runners. Really???? Guns are literally highly optimized murder machines. Yeah, this guy got someone killed, but that doesn't compare to the "mow-em-down free-for-all"
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This is true. For better or worse, pretty much any job asks if you've ever been convicted of a crime. Checking that "yes" box is basically saying "please toss this application in the trash ASAP." There are many reasons why this shouldn't be asked (except in high security positions). It leads to people who com
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Keep in mind that a 5 year sentence also destroys his future.
Excuse me? This shithead was deliberately destroying other people's lives to get twitter handles and one of the people he was harassing died because of his actions. I do not give a single shit that his future is destroyed. He doesn't deserve a future. I think he is a continuing danger to society and should get life.
Hey, it's free speech (Score:2)
Is anyone else Disturbed (Score:5, Insightful)
Now might be a good time to stop voting for tough on crime politicians and politics... I get it I've had a car stolen myself and it's frustrating. But then again 40 50 years of tough on crime politics didn't stop my car from being stolen...
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Um... that's exactly what happened (Score:3)
As for everyone having guns, the cops'll shoot you if they think you've got a knife, sword, baseball bat or pretty much anything. Heck they'll shoot you if they think you're unarmed but hopped up on goof balls. I'm not even a gun owner, but the problem isn't guns.
Now Do the Civil Trial (Score:2)
What about the cops? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:What about the cops? (Score:5, Informative)
In this case the guy died of a heart attack.
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Not isolated and not an 'accident' (Score:4, Interesting)
These guys were doing this tormenting and swatting of many people for some time. Eventually someone was going to get killed.
That's not involuntary. 50 years would be right.
Police (Score:2)
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Show his face (Score:2)
I wanna see this asshat. Why won't they show his face?
Re: Show his face (Score:2)
No police brutality here (Score:2)
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Is this the America that the Founders envisioned?
Possibly, yes. [smithsonianmag.com]
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The CCP troll is going to reply to you now, after looking at your post history, and making up shit, how this is you agitating against China, just so he can get a few social credits...
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