Slashdot Mirror
Jailed Spam King Caught Conspiring to Kill Witness
An anonymous reader writes "Spam king Christopher William Smith, aka Rizler, is facing up to life in prison for conspiracy to tamper with a witness and up to 20 years for endeavoring to obstruct justice. The charges are based on an alleged phone call in which he threatened to have a witness or the witness' family killed to prevent them from testifying against him in an upcoming trial on drug and related charges.
I mean really, does this come as a shock to anybody here? What we really should be doing is pointing this out to the mass media and our friends and coworkers. These people don't understand what us email admins are up against.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
Now, he's in jail, using the jail's phone to set up witness intimidation and, possibly, murder. Anybody who thinks jail phones aren't monitored is a fool. It just goes to show: spammers are stupid.
Good, inexpensive web hosting
One thing I was thinking though, will we get more spam as spammers get more and more time for their crime. Instead of just your grandmas spamming from their computer part time we gonna get sophisticated criminal/spam organizations who will get into this as the chance jail time vs profit increases. Just like drug trafficing. The more time you get for it the more money you can make from it.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
Spammers are sociopaths. It seems for a lot of them that their disregard for basic decency also includes a disregard for basic adherence to the law. I bet a lot of them are guilty of actual definite crimes. It's just a matter of finding what they are. But we can find out who a lot of them are.
I'm going to speak up for everyone who doesn't think rape is funny. This kind of humor is really low and suggests that you (and others) think that rape (and sexually-transmitted diseases) is just punishment for something. There are thousands of people in prison who have committed no violence against anyone, stolen nothing, and they are raped. I really expect a higher standard, even if this is Slashdot.
Ya know what? Prison rape is not funny.
He didn't turn evil. He just turned greedy and stupid.
And yes, this happends to our kids rather quickly nowadays.
Why do people think it's OK to joke about this?
Did you think it was funny in "Shawshenk Redemption?"
Would you think it was funny if this Slashdot story was about Kevin Mitnick being in prison? Would that bring things a little closer to home?
It's depressing enough that the whole country knows this happens while we sit idly by. It's even worse that it's a "nudge nudge, wink wink" kind of joke.
I think that should be the message here. No matter how annoying spam is, it's seldom seen as the type of crime that anybody should really worry about. A lot of people probably don't even see it as a "crime" -- and by people, read legislators. The message from this story is that the kind of people who put together large-scale, organized spam operations are not only a financial burden on society but they are also, sometimes, serious scumbags. Think Al Capone and tax evasion; spam operations should be seen as a red flag for a gray-market mentality, at minimum. Dig a little further and you could find other, more serious criminal operations.
Breakfast served all day!
#1: Of course it's true, don't be dense. Just because it's not a regular part of every con's nightly habit like the TV wants people to think doesn't mean it doesn't happen at all.
#2: Jail is not prison.
From now on, I buy only Intel.
Why do people think it's OK to joke about this?
If Richard Pryor can joke about lighting himself on fire while freebasing or having a heart attack, I can damn well joke about prison rape.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
Oh, how nice. "Not recently". How moral and upstanding!
... torture, really, for moral men to hear. This "not as bad as Hussein" angle is not just that; it's propaganda.
... it's TORTURE. And the only thing that's not stopping it is that there isn't a higher military power to invade the US to enact the necessary regime change.
The backpedaling and endless justifications for American torture practice and methods are just
What the US is doing is not just "humiliation"
Do not confuse the US "humilation of prisoners" with civil treatment by a moral society. Even the rules of war (to which the US professes to be a subscriber) prohibit the things that America now routinely does to prisoners taken in the Middle East. Hypocrisy, hypocrisy, hypocrisy!
[You have a stable society when some nut guns down a schoolyard and the law doesn't change.]
Hemp-related crimes which are non-violent and should be legal in the first place.
Being able to laugh at your own misfortune, even along with others, is quite different from laughing at the pain of others when they themselves quite likely don't think it funny. Specifically, different in a sociopathic kind of way. It is sad that this has to be explained.
"Gold still represents the ultimate form of payment in the world." - Alan Greenspan, 1999
I don't want him raped for practicing free speech. I want him raped for becoming complicit in a national problem by denying it exists and thus participating in a coverup. I do think rape is suitable punishment for rape. Eye for an eye.
But I also wasn't 100% serious. If I had a button that would cause him to be raped, I probably would not push it.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
Thus, he learns that theft and lying are an acceptable means of getting what you want.
Not necessarily acceptable - most criminals know what they are doing is unacceptable - but effective. If you perform small crimes a number of times with no consequences, you tend to think that it's an effective way of making money. You still know it's "wrong" but you don't believe you'll ever have to face the consequences.
I've heard the same is true about gambling - most chronic gamblers are those who have a big win early on. If you give it a go a few times and consistently lose money, your likely not to get hooked. But if you win during your first few tries, your much more likely to become addicted.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
Insightful? I dunno, this comment reads to me as "AAAAAGGGGGGGGGHH!!"
You really *can* joke about anything. It's fine if you don't find it funny (obviously), but saying it's shameful and depressing that people joke lightheartedly about a serious issue is always big buzzkill. It's the conversational equivalent of walking up to a group of people and taking a big shit right in front of them. Thanks for the... input. You're leading the thread in exciting new goddamned directions. Cause, you know, this is secretly a thread about the horrors of prison rape, and jokes are the perfect context for inserting unadulterated activism.
I'm not saying people who are against prison rape are extremists or something (given the high rate of incarceration in this country, we should *all* be against prison rape, more out of personal interest than anything else), but busting out with a big ol' conversational turd like that is in worse taste than the original jokes.
I mean, thanks. Prison rape is actually bad. Wow. I'm gonna devote some serious fuckin' thought to that, because it's just such a provocative statement. This is the kind of thing I have to think about on surveys, too. "In your opinion, is getting involuntarily boned in the ass by a violent felon whilst in prison on a drug charge a good thing or a bad thing?" Uhh... Umm... Crap. Let me think about that. I'll get back to you... Right after I read Slashdot!
Jokes, no matter how offensive or distasteful, are *not* an opportunity for you to point out how offensive something is. Jokes are very frequently funny *because* they make us feel awkward or offended. Unless you think that the people making these jokes are secretly *for* prison rape, your comment is totally unwarranted and pretty solidly off-topic.
...and this sort of thing isn't nearly as commonplace as you seem to imply. Though I was an infantryman in Iraq, my best friend was an interrogator for our battalions S-2 (intelligence) section. Whenever we took prisoners in to S-2, I'd stand in with him during the interrogation; the implied threat of physical violence from me (one of the guys who'd taken the prisoner in the first place, which means he'd already been manhandled, and none too gently, by us) usually enhanced the subjects willingness to talk. The implied threat. I only saw one instance of a prisoner being struck by an American, and that was a piece of shit who had killed three of our men in an IED attack. I'll admit I punched the fucker, too.
If you want to see prisoner abuse, take a look at the Iraqi governments prisoners. They routinely have prisoners who "commit suicide" or were killed "trying to escape". The Iraqi police are particularly bad - I have some pictures of a group of prisoners that were tortured by the IPs. Not interrogated, just tortured. No question asking, just rubber hoses and AK-47s. Compared to a back laid open beatings and AK rounds through the meat of the legs, a few gut punches and a black eye looks pretty damn good. I hate to be the one to break it to you, but the world isn't a black-and-white moral landscape. It's all shades of gray, and sometimes being the lesser of two evils is what makes you the good guy. This "not as bad as Hussein" angle is not just that; it's the plain truth. I envy the apparent strength of your moral convictions, but I pity you for the way you've allowed them to blind you.
Arr! The laws of physics be a harsh mistress!
I strongly suspect he's a sociopath with no conscience or actual sense of right and wrong. I.e. he was born "broken" and by many people's definition, evil.
He's literally willing to do "whatever it takes" to keep himself in the life. Too bad for him he's also an idiot. The world is a better place with him behind bars. Let's hope he stays there for a very long time.
Regards,
Ross
The extremist hyperbole of the left is really starting to piss me off. Torturers used to saw off heads of dissidents while Saddam Hussein watched, yet it is the US who is accused of torture. Not once in the twenty years did the left get pissed at Saddam's torture, but just one false rumour of flushing a Koran down a toilet and all hell breaks loose. This moral equivalency is sickening. It's extemely common for leftists to say it would have been better if Saddam were still there. That's like arguing Hitler should have remained in power because some some US serviceman beat up a jew during the liberation.
I am not condoning the abusive treatment that occured at Abu Gharib, but it must be kept in proportion. It was abuse, but it was not torture. And the people who did have been punished. But the left keeps pretending that it was a policy ordered by Rumsfeld and signed by Bush, committed with bamboo shoots and rubber hoses, and that it is still occuring daily.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
The twenty year sentence, or any kind of punishment, sort of assumes someone actually reports the rape. It also assumes that the report is taken seriously by the guards rather than ignored. Most victims will not even report it in the first place, especially in prison, where informing on another inmate can get you killed. And many prison administrators routinely ignore and even encourage rape in prisons. The rapist is usually not likely deterred by a theoretical 20-year sentence that he will never have to serve.
Rape isn't funny. Death isn't funny. Murder isn't funny. Theft isn't funny. Nazis aren't funny. Bananas aren't funny. Knocking on doors isn't funny. Marriage isn't funny. Divorce isn't funny. Zombies aren't funny. Religion isn't funny. Sports aren't funny. People walking into bars isn't funny. Chickens crossing roads isn't funny.
JOKES ABOUT THEM ARE. THAT'S WHY THEY'RE CALLED JOKES.
Sorry for the shouting. Clueless people raise my blood pressure.
When cryptography is outlawed, bayl bhgynjf jvyy unir cevinpl
The correct answer is an emphatic, "YES!" When the courts martial refused to examine the possibility that Lynndie England was merely following orders, when the Bush administration's highest-ranking lawyer drafts legal briefs on instructions directly from from the President as to why their abuse of prisoners is perfectly legal despite warnings from the Navy's general counsel that the "legal theories granting the president the right to authorize abuse in spite of the Geneva Conventions were unlawful, dangerous and erroneous" -- how the hell could you NOT conclude that
- the Bush administration knew perfectly well what it was doing
- knew that it was illegal
- wanted a legal smokescreen for the time when such activities leaked out
The abuses at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo were all carried out under color of authority -- the administration's authority -- which has violated all manner of treaties to which the United States is signatory, not to mention its own Constitution and laws.The question isn't whether Bush and his greasy pals -- Cheney foremost among them -- should be impeached. The question is, how far down does the moral rot go?
Dog is my co-pilot.
You're half right: Nazis aren't funny. Killing Jews isn't funny. Jokes about them can be funny IF (and this is a very big IF) the joke is a means to relieve tension in an absurd and/or awful situation. People need to joke about terrible things to make sense of the world. Gallows humor. Black comedy. I get that. I even like that.
However: jokes about killing Jews are not funny if the point is to take the actual killing of Jews less seriously. Or to turn killing Jews into entertainment.
Likewise, in this case, if the joke was intended to relieve tension on the agreed horor of prison rape, I'd laugh. That wasn't the point. It never is. People really think prison rape is funny. In and of itself. But it's not. Real torment never is. It's also bad for society. It's bad for you.
Clueless people my ass.
Cheers.
Taken from: http://www.lyricsdomain.com/4/donovan/universal_so ldier.html
Universal Soldier
by Donovan
He's five foot-two, and he's six feet-four,
He fights with missiles and with spears.
He's all of thirty-one, and he's only seventeen,
Been a soldier for a thousand years.
He'a a Catholic, a Hindu, an Atheist, a Jain,
A Buddhist and a Baptist and a Jew.
And he knows he shouldn't kill,
And he knows he always will,
Kill you for me my friend and me for you.
And he's fighting for Canada,
He's fighting for France,
He's fighting for the USA,
And he's fighting for the Russians,
And he's fighting for Japan,
And he thinks we'll put an end to war this way.
And he's fighting for Democracy,
He's fighting for the Reds,
He says it's for the peace of all.
He's the one who must decide,
Who's to live and who's to die,
And he never sees the writing on the wall.
But without him,
How would Hitler have condemned him at Dachau?
Without him Caesar would have stood alone,
He's the one who gives his body
As a weapon of the war,
And without him all this killing can't go on.
He's the Universal Soldier and he really is to blame,
His orders come from far away no more,
They come from here and there and you and me,
And brothers can't you see,
This is not the way we put the end to war.
--
Cheers
Stor
"Yeah well there's a lot of stuff that should be, but isn't"
Lets see here, in order to be a spam king you need to be accomplished in a few of if not all of the followng...
1) Criminal Fruad. (Think "unsubscribe")
2) FCC rule-breaking
3) Microsoft Exploits
4) Bank scams
5) Obscenity
This in addition to what you mentioned, that a spam business indicates more crimes means it should be taken very seriously. Why has the DoJ been so bent on making examples of hackers, but completely ignored the true scum that are scammers?
"And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the World"
1 John 4:14
I totally get that humor can be based on suffering, depending on the context and intent. I laughed in Pulp Fiction when the kid gets his head blown off by accident. But I didn't laugh during Shindler's List. I have a hard time believing you did. There is a difference.
And to be clear: sympathy is not my motivation to dislike prison rape. There are at least three reasons why everyone should be against prison rape:
1. Nearly all criminals are released from prison eventually. If they have been raped they are more dangerous to society.
2. The rapist is experiencing power. Why is anyone in prison allowed the pleasure of feeding their abusive tendancies? See point #1.
3. A society that sanctions human rights violations is fundamentally a less healthy society. Violence anywhere begets violence everywhere. This has been shown over and over again throughout history.
On your tangent: people are not all sadists. How many consciously sadistic acts does the average person undertake per day? Assuming you're living in something that passes for a functioning society, I'd say virtually zero. And you believe this is all simply repression? Even the jerks I know don't seem to take pleasure in hurting, it's just a side effect of their being inconsiderate. In fact, nearly everyone I know takes efforts to avoid causing suffering of others.
Yet we can still laugh at a good Nazi joke. Get used to the complexity of people. Don't get hung up on one point and then paint everything black and white.
Cheers.