Network engineer Terry Childs found guilty of network tampering

SF Examiner ^ | 28 April 2010 | Brent Begin

[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.”

[Still Thinking]

From what I’ve read, that was the purpose of having a jury based system (which if true means it is in the Constitution by implication). I’ve seen quotes that presumed it was common knowledge that this was the expected behavior for jurors.

In fact SCOTUS has explicitly approved nullification itself, though they ruled that as the masters of the government it was the citizen-jurors’ obligation to know what their rights and duties as jurors are, and not the court’s obligation to inform them. If I get a second, I’ll try and look up the case. I think it was in the late 1800’s.

[Fire_on_High]

Pride in your work.

Anyone who likes working with computers takes considerable pride in the machines they build and maintain.

We just got back from buying a replacement power supply after my husband’s unexpectedly failed. Got the replacement from the same shop we got the original case and board from, and the lady who runs it grinned from ear to ear when we told her how happy we were with that machine they built for us.

Same for this guy...he built it, and he wanted to ensure it was treated carefully, not bungled by incompetents. His name was on it, thus his reputation.