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Diebold Whistle-Blower Charged With Felony Access
Vicissidude writes "An employee of law firm Jones Day found legal memos showing that their client, Diebold Election Systems, had used uncertified voting systems in Alameda County elections beginning in 2002 - violating California election law. The whistle-blower turned over the memos to the Oakland Tribune, which published the legal memos on its website in April 2004. The company's AccuVote-TSx model was subsequently banned in May 2004. Now, the whistle-blower, Stephen Heller, has been charged in L.A. Superior Court with felony access to computer data, commercial burglary, and receiving stolen property. If convicted on all three counts, Heller could face up to three years and eight months in state prison. Blair Berk, Heller's attorney state, "Certainly, someone who saw those documents could have reasonably believed that thousands of voters were going to be potentially disenfranchised in upcoming elections." Sandi Gibbons, spokeswoman for the L.A. County district attorney's office rebuts, "He's accused of breaking the law... If we feel that the evidence shows beyond a reasonable doubt in our minds that a crime has been committed, it's our job as a criminal prosecutor to file a case.""
And in other news, whistle-blower Charleton Heston has been charged with attempts to incite a riot as well as breaking and entering at a government food production facility. Although the production of their main product was found to use human beings as a source for protein and flavoring agents, Mr. Heston has been brought into custody.
His public outcries of "Soylent Green is people!" led to a riot that left 4 people dead and many hospitalized in various conditions.
"He did not have clearance to enter the facility. He broke the law, and that's that", said the prosecuting attorney while nibbling on a cube of Soylent Yellow.
The NRA President faces up to 5 years in prison if convicted.
Capitalism: When it uses the carrot, it's called democracy. When it uses the stick, it's called fascism.
"Certainly, someone who saw those documents could have reasonably believed that thousands of voters were going to be potentially disenfranchised in upcoming elections."
So let me get this straight. His "crime" was the fact he alert people to the fact that the local elections were flawed due to the use of uncertified equipment? Is it their argument that because of this people might have disengaged from local politics and that hurts society and thus requires punishment? That's not just absurd, it's scarey.
He's accused of breaking the law... If we feel that the evidence shows beyond a reasonable doubt in our minds that a crime has been committed, it's our job as a criminal prosecutor to file a case.
No it is not. It is your job to prosecute if the following criteria are met:
While the first criteria may well be true, the second one is not. As an aside, pne of the assignments that my brother was asked when he was studying for his law degree was to answer the following question: "Given the fact that Parliament can make any law it pleases, without being constrained by the decisions of previous Parliaments, would the courts uphold a law that sactioned the execution of every blue-eyed baby in the country."
The answer is no. Technically, the court would be obliged to rule in favour of Parliament. This is because we do not have a written constitution that safeguards our rights [1]. However, the view is that the courts would never uphold this because of it's incredible abhorence.
The point of the excercise is to demonstrate one thing to woodbie lawyers: "Just because it's the law does not make it right." Morality and law are seperate beasts. Lying to your wife is immoral but it not a crime. In this case he may have broken the law, but frankly I think that is price worth paying for the value of the information he gave us. What he did was a crime but it was not immoral and did not seek to undermine society.
Simon
[1] - This is becoming less and less true. While in terms of legal theory it is certain that Parliament is not constrained by the decisions of previous Parliaments, in practice this isn't true. There are some acts that would be pretty much impossible to repeal. The European Communities Act (ECA) is a prime example of this kind of legislation. While it's legally possible to repeal the act doing so would require leaving the European Union which will never happen.
Thanks to the ECA, we are slowly acquiring a constitution. The Human Rights Act of 1998 was derived from the European Convention on Human Rights and was the first act of Parliament to acknowledge our fundamental rights in the positive. (i.e. Paraliment stating we have these rights explictly rather than simply failing to prohibit these actions).
You read this and your blood runs cold. It makes you wonder what would happen to George Washington if he was attempting to break the colonies from Britain today.
Sometimes government becomes so complacent, the people accepting of crap, that both need a good house cleaning.
In any event, this country needs a reminder of what the founding fathers had in mind when they formed this country.
It's all quite sad.