Posted on 04/28/2010 8:24:24 AM PDT by ShadowAce
A city employee who hoarded the pass code of a major San Francisco computer network was found guilty Tuesday of blocking city officials from access.
Terry Childs, 45, commandeered The City’s FiberWAN network in July 2008 after his managers began investigating his strange behavior at work. After five years of working with The City, Childs had gained a reputation for his technical knowledge.
He would soon withhold that knowledge from his co-workers and superiors in an effort to protect the infrastructure from “something really bad.”
In the five-month trial, Childs was found guilty of one felony count of computer network tampering with an enhancement alleging the loss of more than $200,000, charges that could net a maximum five-year sentence. Before the trial, a judge dismissed three other felonies that related to his alleged installation of foreign modems at network sites throughout San Francisco.
Childs already has served 21 months in San Francisco County Jail and could possibly be released soon after sentencing June 14.
The case drew national attention because Mayor Gavin Newsom was the only person to whom Childs would release the passwords. The mayor made a jailhouse visit to finally extract the sensitive information from Childs, saying he had “grave concerns” that the computer network would be hacked or destroyed.
Jurors deliberated for less than three days before handing down the verdict. Several said they were sympathetic to Childs and that The City’s Department of Technology should have done a better job of managing the situation, but yet he clearly broke the law.
“I don’t think we wanted to come up with this verdict, but we had to follow the law,” juror Jason Chilton said.
While Childs defended himself by saying he was protecting the system from an incompetent city government, another juror said that was a bad excuse.
“The desire to protect a system doesn’t justify his actions,” juror Amy Heine said.
Childs’ attorney, Richard Shikman, said his client did not deserve to be prosecuted to such an extent.
“Crimes are acts of moral turpitude, where there’s an element of venality to criminal behavior,” he said. “I just didn’t see it in this case.”
Actually you didn't you low grade moron.
Idiot. No, you didn't. That's one of a jury's functions, to catch those cases where a literal interpretation of the law would produce an injustice. (Not saying that's the situation with this defendant, I know nothing about the case. Just saying this moron has NO concept of a jury's Constitutional responsibilities). The defendant should be able to sue the court for failing to provide him with a pool of competent jurors.
You’re both faster and more succinct than I!
He should've hired Jackie Chiles...
There was no mens rea in this whatsoever. How can they possibly find him guilty?
Every network engineer in the country, be warned. You may go to jail for protecting your network.
"Tamper with the network? Who told you to tamper with the network?"
90% of Americans have NO concept of a jury’s Constitutional responsibilities. Of the other 10%, 8% of them don’t have the backbone to exercise their Constitutional duties if it would make them the only person in the room to be doing so.
How’s that saying go about being a patriot? Something about other will join you when the majority agrees.
This case should have never come to be. Management in the city's IT organization was terrible. There were no adopted security policies or procedures in place. This was a situation that management allowed to develop until it came to this unfortunate point. They did everything wrong that they possibly could have to create this situation. However, the city was not on trial, but Terry Childs was. And when we went into that jury room, we had very explicit instructions on what laws we were to apply and what definitions we were to follow in applying those laws.
...
We were not allowed to let our emotions or biases determine the matter, because if they could there may have been a different outcome. Quite simply, we followed the law. I personally, and many of the other juror, felt terrible coming to this verdict. Terry Childs turned his life around and educated himself in the networking field on very complex technologies. One different decision by him, or more effective management by the city could have completely avoided this entire scenario. But those are not factors we could consider as a jury. We applied the law as it was provided to us and our verdict was the unfortunate, but inevitable result.Simply put, jurors (and not juges) should be the arbiters of both the facts and the law. But if that's not what they are taught in school, if that's not what they are told by the judge, if lawyers are forbidden from telling them that, then who can blame them if they feel terrible for reaching an "unfortunate" verdict?
You're blaming the shortcoming of the masters on their hired help! I'm with SCOTUS on this one, if they're adult citizens it's their job to know their job. Now I don't think courts should be able to instruct jurors the OPPOSITE, which would be a lie, but keeping mum, I don't have too much problem with.
Common sense should tell them that. Do you believe people when they tell you something that violates common sense?
And yet another case where “jury nullification” would have served well.
I find this silly. The guy didn’t own the network. He had little vested interest in it’s security. Why did he care if it was hacked through no fault of his own? Let it burn.
Yeah, well there's the problem. Who's definition of "injustice" will the jury use?
Would you be keen on a jury with that attitude if you were on trial for shooting someone in self-defense? ...and the jury was a bunch of gun-grabbers? It would be a big "injustice" in some people's eyes for anyone to be set free after shooting some poor, disadvantaged kid.
Jury nullification is a dangerous double-edged sword.
Their own. That was the plan. Yes, it will vary slightly from jury to jury. But there needs to be a check on government from passing laws not accepted by the public.
Slightly? You hope.
Remember, jurors are the same people as voters. Why would they suddenly be wiser in a jury box than they are at the ballot box?
But there needs to be a check on government from passing laws not accepted by the public.
There is already such a check. It's called an election.
Laws not accepted by the public can be repealed or amended.
Take it up with the founders. I tend to agree with them, but I think they were a lot smarter than I.
Besides, when was the last time you saw a law repealed after the legislature that passed it went through an election?
How many of the founders believed in jury nullification? One? Two?
Why isn't it in the Constitution?
Why have laws at all, if the jury is smart enough to deal "justice" on their own? Why bother with legislation, voting, etc. Why not just call on 12 people to administer "justice" in every case?
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