Slashdot Mirror
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."
Which requires them to know what all of the equipment is, and potentially all of the software installed in all of it. Information for which Childs was supposed to be the source.
I'm not saying that the $5 million bail is right, but it's not at all inconceivable that Childs could cause damage to that network if he chose to do so.
Are you adequate?
The legal system requires that a person have a trial within ten days of being arrested. Often times during the process, they waive that right. Terry Childs has only himself and his lawyer to blame for still being in jail after fourteen months. He could have had his trial and been sentenced by now.
I was responding to the "Most routers have a way of resetting the root password" part. He turned that off.
But, yes, he did eventually hand over the passwords. And yes, they should have the network audited and secured by now -- long ago, in fact. They're just keeping him locked up because they can -- much the same way he lorded over the FiberWAN network.
After all that, he was just being a dick, and it's stupid to be a dick to people who can have you locked up in jail. This may be United States, but it's not the United States you were (probably) taught about in grade school.
True. But it's also against the law to lock someone up just for being an arrogant asshole. When he gets out, he's going to be able to sue the fuck out of them. Enjoy the windfall sir!
all of his authority with respect to this network come from his supervisor/manager. He only has the authority to "do what's best for the network" as long as it's still granted to him by his supervisor. As soon as his supervisor revokes that authority, he no longer has the privilege of deciding what is best for the network.
And as soon as his employment is terminated, his obligations to that supervisor end, including the divulging of passwords.
After all that, he was just being a dick
I would consider someone firing you and then saying "Oh by the way I forgot to ask you to do something before I fired you, do it now or I'll get my friends to stick you in prison" to be the dick.
You have to wonder why his boss isn't sitting in jail for letting such a valuable resource (as shown by the bail figure) be endangered by the chance that said Terry Childs gets run over by a bus (or otherwise kicks the bucket).
The only reason that the password/s had value was because of someone else's incompetence.