Palin Email Snoop Found Guilty On 2 Charges 291
netbuzz writes "A federal jury in Knoxville today has convicted David Kernell, 22, of two charges — misdemeanor computer fraud and felony obstruction of justice — in connection with the 2008 episode where he accessed the personal Yahoo email account of Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin and then initiated a worldwide rummaging of its contents. The obstruction charge carries a maximum prison term of 20 years."
Jury also hung on one count (Score:5, Insightful)
Why is this different? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Why is this different? (Score:4, Insightful)
One is a felony Mail tampering, one is computer tampering. Email is not considered the same as regular Mail.
And while my mailbox has a lock on it, it is simple and easy to bypass, I'd hate to see people make the same excuses for someone lifting mail from my box as they do for people lifting email from Hotmail (or whatever).
Re:Two Stupid People (Score:5, Insightful)
Lessons learned (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I'm still confused by something... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Why is this different? (Score:3, Insightful)
Ah, so it's OK to steal stuff you regard as inadequately secured.
The dog gets forgiveness, the human should get prison. In your Porche hypothetical, the thief would still go down for GTA.
"Sorry about turning off your respirator, but that should have been keylocked, you know...I couldn't resist."
Re:Two Stupid People (Score:5, Insightful)
You mean, people put honest answers in those fields??? [boggles]
Cost of imprisonment isn't worth it. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Why is this different? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why bother picking a lock when there's so many other easier ways to get into the average house? Breaking a window is trivial, drilling out a lock isn't hard, etc. To someone even mildly determined to get in, the average house lock is less of a issue than a weak password is for an email account.
While it's certainly smarter to have a strong password than a weak one, to say that having a weak password should mean that you take on some of the legal responsibility for a crime committed against you by someone else is ridiculous.
Re:I'm still confused by something... (Score:3, Insightful)
Wow, that's a slippery slope. So the police can "encourage" third parties to obtain evidence illegally, then use that evidence. For various definitions of "encourage" which will include pay, bribe, threaten, trade, plea-bargain, extort, harass, intimidate, and some I probably haven't thought of.
Re:20 years? (Score:2, Insightful)
Kernell was found guilty of computer fraud - a misdemeanor subject to a prison term of up to one year -- and obstruction of justice, which carries a maximum 20-year sentence.
Don't lie to the feds. They get all bent out of shape about that. Frankly, even if they were to question me about someone else's crime, I would give serious consideration to refusing to speak to them, out of concern that my version of events might not be the same as someone else's, and they might decide that I was the one "misremembering".
Re:I'm still confused by something... (Score:4, Insightful)
They do.
Re:I'm still confused by something... (Score:2, Insightful)
Wow, that's a slippery slope. So the police can "encourage" third parties to obtain evidence illegally, then use that evidence. For various definitions of "encourage" which will include pay, bribe, threaten, trade, plea-bargain, extort, harass, intimidate, and some I probably haven't thought of.
And if the police did any of those things, the third party would automatically become an agent of the state. Just like an employee.
Re:I'm still confused by something... (Score:5, Insightful)
That would be fascinating to hear about, tell us more.
Re:Two Stupid People (Score:3, Insightful)
Did he figure out the name of Obama's first pet, where he went to school, his first job, his mother's maiden name, or what? All of those things have got to be fairly easy to work out.
You'd think so, given the vetting which is supposed to go into establishing a person's qualifications for the Office of the President but there's been substantial research into each of those things, and each of them bring up non-trivial questions of the veracity of so-called "established fact". Kinda odd considering the public scrutiny - in the media, government, and otherwise - of every other President to date.
It's always a good day when privacy protections (Score:5, Insightful)
are upheld in Court. Personal email really IS private, and people should be held accountable if they cross the line. Jail time sounds a bit extreme, given the youthful age of the accused, but I'm glad the legal precedents are being followed correctly.
Re:So you kill a guy, can get out in 2 years min (Score:3, Insightful)
but you do this, and you get 20 years on average.
it seems like u.s. justice system is so fucked up.
In the American federal system, murder is almost always prosecuted under state law. Sentencing Guidelines As Applied To Murder [crimevictimsunited.org] [Oregon, 1998]
You want to see a change in sentencing? Talk to your state legislator.
Re:Two Stupid People (Score:3, Insightful)
There are two stupid people at the heart of this story, David Kernell and Sarah Palin.
Huh? How was Palin stupid in the context of this incident? Was she stupid to use email, as she should have known the extremists on the Left would hack it? Or just stupid because she disagrees with your views?
Apparently, Palin must not have used that account in any way that seriously violated any ethics rules and/or laws in any meaningful way or she would have been tarred, feathered, pilloried, and publicly horse-whipped on the Senate and/or House floors before being jailed by those who were (and still are) out to personally destroy the woman.
If there had been anything that could have even remotely made even the most shaky, thin case against Palin in the emails, you don't think it would have been the subject of a special Congressional committee and/or special prosecutor? You don't think that was *exactly* the intent behind the account cracking?
I don't care about "R" or "D", as both have been for larger government & larger national debt, but this was a really sleazy dirty trick and those behind anything like it, regardless of party/ideology, should be aggressively prosecuted and sentenced severely if found guilty.
Strat
Re:Justice? (Score:3, Insightful)
i'll one better you.. wearing gloves to prevent fingerprints from being left is obstruction!
Re:Cost of imprisonment isn't worth it. (Score:5, Insightful)
...I don't want my taxes spent on keeping this man imprisoned for up to twenty years. Cost of imprisonment is on average 22,650 per year, at 20 years that's $453,000. In my opinion it's not worth that much to keep a man behind bars for guessing a password.
He won't get anything near 20 years. In a case like this he'll get almost no time in a minimal security facility, then he'll be put on probation for a number of years and he might also have to do community service or similar. Total cost to the taxpayer will be minimal, the trial itself will probably cost more than the actual imprisonment.
That being said, you NEED to have the threat of 20 years so that there's a possible consequence to your actions. If you break into someone's e-mail there should be penalties and just the possibility of 20 years behind bars is enough to keep most people from trying this sort of thing. You also need it for repeat offenders so that you can punish them properly. This doesn't mean you always need to give the maximum, that's why it's a maximum and not a set amount.
Re:I'm still confused by something... (Score:3, Insightful)
More unsubstantiated hear say to go along with all of the other whispers about Sarah and her family.
So basically a home up for sale was broken into by 3 adult boys, some underage boys and some underage girls. A party occurred and some damage was done. When caught, all of the boys blame one of the underage girls, whose mother just happens to be the ex-governor of the state. The ex-governor then starts calling in favors, intimidating the other parents and calling secret meetings with state officials to cover up her daughter's crime.
Or at least, that's what 1 blogger says happened and another blogger has decided must be the truth.
Sorry, but color me not convinced.
Actually... (Score:4, Insightful)
It is still considered theft if someone enters my house and takes some of my belongings even if I leave my door is unlocked. Ditto for leaving the keys in my car and someone takes it or leaving the car running unattended while I go into a store or something.
For some reason a lot of /. people seem to think that not securing your property suddenly makes it fair game for anyone who wants to take it. The crime occurs when someone takes something that doesn't belong to them regardless of how well or how poorly it is secured.
Personally, I lock my doors, don't leave my keys in my car, set up a RADIUS server for my wireless authentication, etc. I'd rather my stuff not get stolen or my network get broken into in the first place. There was a time when people respected other people's privacy and property. That doesn't seem to happen any more.
Cheers,
Dave
Re:Two Stupid People (Score:4, Insightful)
Was she stupid to use email, as she should have known the extremists on the Left would hack it?
Umm... what?
This guy wasn't an extremist anything, I was there reading the thread when he posted it, he mentioned in his thread that there wasn't anything interesting in it. [Apparently this somehow gets construed as him being an evil liberal socialist hippie extremist out to overthrow the government...] Then some whiteknight went and changed the password so that nobody could access the account.
The dude was just doing what any average person in his position would be doing if they got to look at Obama's emails or Dick Cheney's emails or Bush's emails.
As a Canadian, I've got to say, this Republican vs Democrat stuff is really really getting out of hand. Are you people children or adults, FFS.
Re:I'm still confused by something... (Score:3, Insightful)
I have no idea what she may or may not have done while she was there, but there's no way that she thought it was legal for her to be in that house doing whatever it was she was doing. Let's say, for sake of argument, that some random guy broke down my front door and then, later, Willow Palin noticed my door was open, walked in, spent several hours hanging out in my house, broke nothing and took nothing. Unless I'm crazy (which is always a possibility), it's still criminal trespassing. If she accompanied the guy as he broke my door down and hung out with him and then neglected to tell anyone about it, IANAL, but that sort of complicity seems like it should be worth some equivalent of an accessory charge.
And finally, the fact that the girls were let off scot free and the boys were all charged really bugs me. There are facts I don't know, but the fact that *all* the girls were freed and *all* the boys were punished suggests the sort of sexist doublestandard I've become all too used to in this society. Surely girls are too sweet and innocent to have done such a thing!
Re:Jury also hung on one count (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, Palin only said that you could see Russia from Alaska, which is only a hair less idiotic when you consider that she was trying to claim that as a reason for why she has experience in international politics. Most people don't differentiate because both comments are so idiotic that there isn't a difference worth caring about.
Re:Two Stupid People (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why is this different? (Score:3, Insightful)
In real life I'd totally agree. But you don't secure your house with a lock which opens if you state the place where you met your future husband as prove of your identity. Just imagine how a case of trespassing would end in court if you had such kind of security.
He crossed a line, but is it really computer fraud if you bypass a system by common knowledge?
Whenever I'm forced to state my favorite dog or my mother's maiden name I type some random stuff - everything else would be highly irresponsible.
Re:Two Stupid People (Score:3, Insightful)
If there had been anything that could have even remotely made even the most shaky, thin case against Palin in the emails, you don't think it would have been the subject of a special Congressional committee and/or special prosecutor? You don't think that was *exactly* the intent behind the account cracking?
Actually, I was on ebaumsworld when the account was "hacked" and the first screenshots were posted and I can assure you it was done for the lulz [encycloped...matica.com] and not some some diabolical political purpose.
Sure, and I'm certain that if the son/daughter of a Republican politician had cracked Obama's or Hillary's email accounts that all those claiming the Palin email crack was the equivalent of a random prank would feel the same.
If it were for laughs, why did he not try cracking email accounts of Hillary or Obama and instead chose Palin? Just because the politically-motivated cracker was incompetent at exploiting the data politically or even at hiding his tracks doesn't affect the fact that Palin was a target because she was (and remains) a threat to the Progressive social & political agenda.
Strat
Re:I'm still confused by something... (Score:3, Insightful)
If they went after the Bush administration for doing it, they would have to go after the Obama administration also. It's a slippery slope that leads to everyone getting attacked.
GOOD. If both sides are equally corrupt, then fucking prosecute both sides for corruption.
Re:Two Stupid People (Score:2, Insightful)
"The dude was just doing what any average person in his position would be doing if they got to look at Obama's emails or Dick Cheney's emails or Bush's emails. "
What the hell kind of world do you live in where it is socially acceptable to just paw through other people's private email accounts for the lulz? What if you find communication between a lawyer about criminal cases, about taxes? What about communication with a doctor about a medical condition? What about communication with members of the clergy about person issues?
The motivation behind the attack does not change the fact that there WAS an unauthorized security breach.
That no sensitive data was found does not eliminate the legal consequences of that illegal act.
Re:Jury also hung on one count (Score:3, Insightful)
Everyone makes mistakes ... how many states are there again [latimes.com] ?
Unless of course he was telling a future truth ... and this is perhaps how he wanted to accomplish that [timesonline.co.uk].
And frankly, in case anyone missed it ... Obama is a lawyer. A lawyer who went into politics. With all that goes with it. You'd think slashdot would support the candidate that cares about issues they'd consider important [gamepolitics.com] (not that I have too many illusions about McCain being different, but hey if there's a choice between someone in big content's bed versus someone merely flirting with them, I know what to choose. At least the next set of shitty laws would take longer in coming. Besides democrats voted in the dmca, if anyone's going to vote it back out it'll be the other party).
Re:Two Stupid People (Score:3, Insightful)
If it were for laughs, why did he not try cracking email accounts of Hillary or Obama and instead chose Palin?
What bizarre alternate universe did you come from?
Just because the politically-motivated cracker was incompetent at exploiting the data politically or even at hiding his tracks doesn't affect the fact that Palin was a target because she was (and remains) a threat to the Progressive social & political agenda.
Palin is/was a threat to anyone? Really?
....Three Stupid People (Score:3, Insightful)
The perp here is the son of Mike Kernell, a long-serving Democrat in the Tennessee state legislature.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Kernell [wikipedia.org]
Young David wasn't just looking around for any old account to break into, he was actively working on the account of a political opponent of his father's.
This also implies that David, despite claims that it was for "lulz", was almost certainly conducting a targeted search of her email. There would be no other reason for the son of a prominent Democrat to do what he did.
This is Watergate. The only difference is the desire of the American media to tar and feather those involved.
Re:Actually... (Score:3, Insightful)
It already is. My suggestion was to change that... How you think you can add a contradictory conditional to that is beyond me.
Horses were more valuable then than cars are today...
But that aside, I'd be happy to let you live in your little slice of heaven, where every kid going on a joy ride gets executed, and every shoplifter takes out 20 innocent bystanders rather than give themselves up, due to the draconian punishment...
It's only in the right-wind fantasy world that, when the punishment is harsh enough, crimes stop being committed. The opposite is actually quite true. And I'd be damn sure you've made plenty of mistakes in your life, which you've conveniently forgotten about... Sure, YOU deserved a light punishment, but everyone else should be locked-up forever!
Re:Jury also hung on one count (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes, Palin only said that you could see Russia from Alaska, which is only a hair less idiotic when you consider that she was trying to claim that as a reason for why she has experience in international politics. Most people don't differentiate because both comments are so idiotic that there isn't a difference worth caring about.
Well, this proves the first statement is not idiotic, as you put it, but is factual.
From: http://www.gov.state.ak.us/trade/2003/tad/russia/facts.htm [state.ak.us]
"At their closest Alaska and Russia are 2.5 miles apart – the distance between Little Diomede Island, Alaska, and Big Diomede Island, Russia. The two islands straddle the U.S.-Russian maritime border in the middle of the Bering Strait. In mid-winter, when the Bering Strait freezes, it is possible to walk between the two islands – from American to Russia, from today to tomorrow, or from Russia to the United States, from today to yesterday. It is even possible to stand on the frozen Bering Strait, with one foot in America and one foot in Russia, straddling the frontiers of distant boundaries and time travel."
If you don't get the part about "today to tomorrow" and vice versa, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Date_Line [wikipedia.org]
"In the north, the date line swings to the east through the Bering Strait, and then west past the Aleutian Islands to keep Alaska (part of the United States) and Russia, which are due north and south of each other in that region, on opposite sides of the line and in agreement with the date in the rest of those countries. As a result of this line-adjusting, the right to call itself "The Last Place on Earth" (that is, the latest place) goes to the westernmost Aleutian Island of Attu.
The date line passes equidistantly between the two Diomede Islands—Little Diomede Island (US) and Big Diomede Island (Russia)—at a distance of 1.5 km (1 mi) from each island."
Palin's foreign policy experience remark regarding the proximity of Russia was a humorous rebuttal and counterattack on Obama's lack of foreign policy experience. Neither of them had any. Palin was saying, humorously, that she has slightly more foreign policy experience than Obama because Russia is right next door to Alaska. This remark was twisted by the liberal mainstream media, as usual, to make a Republican candidate look bad. If you have seen the video of that rally, it is abundantly clear she was poking fun at the opposition, _not_ making a serious statement about her foreign affairs experience.