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Judge Won't Lower $5M Bail For Jailed SF IT Admin
snydeq writes "San Francisco County Judge Charles Haines has denied Terry Childs' motion to reduce his $5 million bail, alluding to 'public security concerns,' according to Richard Shikman, who is representing Childs in court. The ruling comes in the wake of a recent decision to drop three of the four changes that have been levied against Childs, who has spent the past 14 months in jail. The fourth charge — that Childs violated a California statute regarding illegal denial of service for the San Francisco FiberWAN — has been called into question by those closely monitoring the case. As a point of comparison, the San Francisco Felony Bail Schedule lists a $1 million bail for the most serious crimes, such as sexual assault of a child, aggravated arson, or kidnapping for ransom. Prosecutors have argued that the bail is appropriate because, if released, Childs could cause damage to San Francisco's network."
I can kind of understand why they would set the bail so high if they don't want him out of prison during the trial, because he probably has more money than the average murderer or rapist, and could actually afford a $1 million bail. On the other hand, I don't understand why they don't want him out of prison during the trial. Especially since the article mentions he's already served more time than his eventual sentence will be, even if he's found guilty.
If I were Mr Childs, at this point my thoughts would be less on vandalizing the network and more on vandalizing the nose of the prosecuting attorney who convinced the judge that there was some sort of danger to the network if I was released.
Qxe4
Maybe I don't remember HS Civic's very well but I thought the point of bail was ONLY to prevent flight, not that it had been redefined to be large as a result of danger the innocent (until proved otherwise) person poses. He's being jailed not because he's a flight risk but because of political posturing by the DA, that is a serious miscarriage of justice. I don't have a lot of sympathy for the guy but bail is clearly being misused here.
They were treated that way because Mitnick and in this case Childs didn't learn from the down falls of others. I was into messing with phone systems, cellular systems and other "key infrastructure" type systems in the early 1990s. At that point in time I was in my early teens and pretty much immune from prosecution for my actions. I also had the benefit of the fact that very few people knew anything about networked systems and laws like DCMA and the like weren't on the books. When I turned 18 I took a look around me and I realized this very key thing. The "powers that be" made a conscious decision to spend their efforts prosecuting people who exploit obvious and "easy to secure" holes in systems. I had access to 5ESS switches not because I was an uber hacker, but because the admins were lazy and never changed default passwords and/or failed to shred trash. Rather than spending the effort to educate/train competent admins and put an emphasis on securing systems, they decided to take the approach of severely punishing anyone who messed with the systems. In my case, the approach worked. Free phone calls and root accounts on systems weren't worth trading for jail time in Federal prison.
Terry Childs seems to have made the mistake that a lot of socially inept people make. They tend to believe that their knowledge will insulate them from the brute force of the establishment. Childs apparently felt that he was doing the right thing and wasn't able to distance himself from his own beliefs long enough to recognize that they were putting him in jeopardy. The way he has been treated is absolutely reprehensible. What it isn't is unpredictable. A person who stands in the way of the government should either be ready to start a full on insurrection, or be prepared to be cast aside. The government doesn't do what is "right". They do what needs to be done to maintain order.
no, it was a network that had him as the "caretaker". Despite the methods, from what has been said, what he was doing was trying to protect the network. As a "caretaker", it's his job to do what he must to protect the network. Of course, there are proper methods and limits, but I don't see why what he did would justify 14 months in jail and $5M bail. They've had the passwords for over a year, for God sake. If he wanted the network to get stuffed, he could have very well also let the passwords somewhere else or with someone else to do the job for him in case anything happened to him, so they could hold the network hostage. Did that happened? Childs seems to be a guy to smart to NOT do something like this if his intentions were less than honorable (regardless of the methods).
Onda Technology Institute
Phillip Garrido is only being held on $1 million bail. Which one do you think can do more damage if released, Childs or Garrido? If you answered "Childs", I would insist your priorities are seriously fucked up.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
Is there anything that can be done for him?
As a SysAd and citizen I find this case to be disturbing. I don't know if visiting him in jail would be helpful.
Do they even let one have cookies in there? Cookies may not help him or his case, but cookies can taste good.
20 characters max for the password? How will I use my favorite poems as passwords?