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It should be a serious crime. I haven't maintained otherwise. I just questioned that it should be a ten year prison sentence level of serious. That's over the top even by American standards of jurisprudence. In New York State, assuming no prior convictions, you need a class C felony to reach that kind of sentence. For perspective, class C felonies include robbery, burglary, criminal possession of a weapon, soliciting or supporting an act of terrorism, assault on a judge or first responder, or an attempt to commit a class B felony. There's some non-violent crimes in there too, primarily fraud that reaches a certain dollar amount.

IANAL but the closest charge we would have here to fit swatting would probably be falsely reporting an incident in the third degree, which is a misdemeanor. A reading of the law would seem to support bumping it up to first degree if someone is killed as a result of the false report, which makes it a class D felony.

I can only speak for New York State; in NYS when charges are dropped/dismissed or the defendant acquitted you receive a canned "Order of Dismissal" from the court. This order provides that:

1. Records of the arrest held at the State level are sealed in almost all instances, with specified exemptions, one of which is pistol license applications. Apply for a NYS pistol license and they can and will obtain the sealed records.
2. All copies of fingerprints taken by the State are ordered to be destroyed or returned to the defendant.
3. The State Court asks the Feds to destroy any copies of records transmitted to them by the State of New York after your arrest.

The astute observer will note the bolded part of #3; virtually all local/state arrests in the United States are reported to the FBI by your State's clearinghouse. In New York State it's the Division of Criminal Justice Services. They usually transmit your fingerprints to the Feds too. If you think the Feds are deleting these records because some State Court asks (not orders) them to I've got a bridge to sell you.....

For what it's worth, the FBI won't disclose records in most instances, except to the applicable parties (i.e., you, via a FOIA request), so it's not something that will show up on a private background check. It will show up as part of any Federal background investigation (i.e., for a security clearance) and is almost certainly made available to State and Local law enforcement authorities.

Another thing to keep in mind: If you're asked whether or not you've ever been arrested and choose to lie about it you may well have committed a crime, depending on the circumstances. A verbal lie to a private citizen or employer? Most likely not a crime. A written lie, i.e., an employment application? In New York State it could be considered a forged instrument.

The other hole that exists is the public record. If you make the police blotter in the local paper it's almost certainly going to go online and get captured by Google. At that point there isn't a court in the world that's powerful enough to make it go away. The United States has no right to be forgotten, so that shit is going to be out there for your entire life, available to anyone who is smart enough to look for it.

In my particular case I was lucky, the police had it in their heads that I had information on co-conspirators, and they very deliberately kept it out of the blotter hoping that I would roll on them. The only records that exist of my arrest are held in Albany and Washington, available only under select circumstances, and I've yet to come across an employment application that asks about arrests. Most only care about convictions, and I answer "No" to that question in good faith.

No, but where is the "crime"?

The crime is using a password you didn't have permission to use to gain access to a computer account that a reasonable person would have known they would not entitled to access.

Disclaimer: I am not justifying it, I think this is overreaction is patently stupid, I am just explaining what the underlying criminal offense is.

I am surprised it's a felony level offense; I just pursued New York State's penal law and our most analogous offenses are both misdemeanors; I guess that's Florida for you. In New York you would have to access "computer material" (i.e., steal a file) to turn it into a felony, or be engaged in the commission of another felony while accessing the system without authorization.

No, but where is the "crime"?

The crime is using a password you didn't have permission to use to gain access to a computer account that a reasonable person would have known they would not entitled to access.

Disclaimer: I am not justifying it, I think this is overreaction is patently stupid, I am just explaining what the underlying criminal offense is.

I am surprised it's a felony level offense; I just pursued New York State's penal law and our most analogous offenses are both misdemeanors; I guess that's Florida for you. In New York you would have to access "computer material" (i.e., steal a file) to turn it into a felony, or be engaged in the commission of another felony while accessing the system without authorization.

No, but where is the "crime"?

The crime is using a password you didn't have permission to use to gain access to a computer account that a reasonable person would have known they would not entitled to access.

Disclaimer: I am not justifying it, I think this is overreaction is patently stupid, I am just explaining what the underlying criminal offense is.

I am surprised it's a felony level offense; I just pursued New York State's penal law and our most analogous offenses are both misdemeanors; I guess that's Florida for you. In New York you would have to access "computer material" (i.e., steal a file) to turn it into a felony, or be engaged in the commission of another felony while accessing the system without authorization.

Basically, 100 years ago the big mean car companies were sometimes mean to local dealers. Here's a list of things dealers claimed that manufacturers did, as codified in New York law:
http://ypdcrime.com/vt/article...

If the car dealer fought back, the manufacturer would either a) threaten to open a new dealership next door or b) stop delivering cars to the dealership.
Like laws that force companies to work with unions, these laws force manufacturers to work with local dealers. If the manufacturer cut off the dealer's sales they'd be cutting off their own sales too.

This grew out of earlier laws that said you had to be licensed to be a car dealer, much as real estate agents are licensed. It was easy enough to tack on the sentence "manufacturers can't be licensed as dealers".

Doing as the OP suggests would, almost certainly, "cause reasonable fear of material harm to the physical health, safety or property of such person, a family member, or an acquaintance"

Such a threat is implicit in the actions advocated by OP.

That's the definition of "assault", but I suppose I should have expected severe overlap so they can charge you with half a dozen crimes at once...

According to Article 120 of NY State Penal Law, that is not the case. According to NY State law, "Menacing" comes close, but the definition of "Assault" does not. At least that's how I read the law. IANAL, YMMV

Why, you might ask, do I focus on NY State law? According to the filing with the USPTO, Paul Ingrisano lists his zip code as 11204 (Brooklyn, NY).

..... If an actual lawyer could comment on the possibility of any sort of lawsuit. While the article does reference this, it isn't clear if this could be done on a federal scale. That leaves the whole issue of a potential class action lawsuit up in the air IMHO.

Having said that, I hope it scares the crap out of Comcast (and any other ISP dumb enough to try this).