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Man Gets 12-Year Jail Sentence For Planting Child Porn On Enemy's Computer
An anonymous reader writes with an update to a story we discussed in August about Neil Weiner, a man who sought to ruin the life of a school caretaker by planting child pornography on his computer. Weiner has now been convicted on two counts of possession of child pornography and one count of perverting the course of justice. He was sentenced to 12 years in jail.
"The judge told Weiner that his plot to have Mr. Thompson sacked and prosecuted very nearly succeeded. Police had been careful not to make public their arrest of the caretaker and only informed those at the school who needed to know, he said. 'But you gratuitously and spitefully informed the local press so that he and his wife suffered the distress of the unwelcome publicity which followed.' Mr. Thompson's health and that of his wife suffered. The judge said: 'There are still those who believe, and probably always will, that he is a pedophile. I am wholly satisfied that Mr. Thompson is innocent.' ... Weiner had discovered the caretaker's password by looking over his shoulder one day and been caught doing so. When Mr. Thompson was asked why he did not change it, he said he wished he had, adding: 'Who in their worst nightmares would could have thought that anyone could stoop to do what he did?'"
What an appropriate charge. Also, this guy can rot.
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All of the above combined
When the foot seeks the place of the head, the line is crossed. Know your place. Keep your place. Be a shoe.
Who in their worst nightmares would could have thought that anyone could stoop to do what he did?
This clearly illustrates that until lay persons learn to think otherwise in terms of privacy and security on systems and networks; nothing is going to get better.
Did you ever wake up in the morning, with a Zombie Woof behind your eyes? -- FZ
This isn't surprising when you have laws forbidding the possession of information and a stigma that persists if someone were to openly come against ridiculous laws simply forbidding possession of information.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
'Who in their worst nightmares would could have thought that anyone could stoop to do what he did?
When I was growing up, my dad once told me something along the lines of, "Boy, think of the worst, meanest, most downright, terrible thing you would be willing to do to someone that you truly hated. Now, you can safely make the assumption that someone else out there could come up with something worse if you give them enough reason. Remember that."
I always did.
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If you RTFA, you'd know both the man and his family were subjected to months of abuse while the investigation proceeded, and the abuse occurred because the guy framing him leaked the charge to the news media. Yes, he should have changed his password, but that just puts him in the same category as the overwhelming majority of people who don't keep their office computers sufficiently secure.
And yes, for many people, being accused of pedophelia IS worse than being charged with murder. I know a man who lost his job, his house and his family while his case dragged through the courts. The whole town thought he was guilty. He was beaten twice, once very severely. The kids who accused him eventually recanted their stories, but the damage was done. So you can take your self-righteousness and shove it straight up your ass.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Shit, it's basically impossible to keep your computer "sufficiently secure" from anybody who has physical access to it all weekend like a co-worker. If someone wants to plant something on your machine, they're going to be able to do it. Even if you're paranoid and encrypt your hard drive and take your laptop home with you every night someone can still come in and stick a keylogger in your keyboard. Then it's just 10 minutes one lunchtime and you're forced to literally live under a bridge, alone and penniless until you die. That's the power of invoking one of our cultures most forbidden taboos.
I read the internet for the articles.
"So you can take your self-righteousness and shove it straight up your ass."
I agree, I'm troubled by what more people than me are calling the 21st century equivalent of the Salem witch trials, made even more cogent by these frame charges. Every one of the supposed "witches" were simply accused of witchcraft by a group of four bored teenagers. The lives of the entire family faculty of McMartin PreSchool were destroyed because one child lied. Mere possession can land you in more hot water than murder? That's ridiculous. I'm not condoning pedophilia, but I think people & media are caught in a sensationalism that rivals yellow journalism from the 1900's.
Python: 'And then suddenly you have a language which says "we're all stuck with whatever the whiniest coder wants".'
As others have pointed out, you were a contractor. Your choice. And this is your side of the story, I'm sure it leaves out some details. If you had an actual case, you could go to court. But you don't, do you? And so you daydream about ruining someone's entire life. Did you know the idea of "an eye for an eye" was originally not seen as harsh,because it was meant to replace "Your life for an eye." Of course nowadays, even "an eye for an eye" is seen as unjust. But you seem to think that even "an eye for an eye" is not harsh enough.
If your boss had a problem with you watching Fox News, it sounds like you were simply not a good fit. Why stay at a place you are not wanted, especially as a contractor? Do you not feel confident in your abilities to find work? If that's the case, perhaps you should not be a contractor. She did you a favor, enabling you to look for a job where your political views would not be an issue. If you were a real employee, you might have a case. If you had some sort of protections written into your contract, you might have a case. But that is not how contractors generally work, they generally work at the whims of those that employ them, and can be let go for any reason or none, at any time.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
If you catch somebody at work doing it, report it to their manager immediately! I've had people fired for this, at IBM we are trained to swivel 180 degrees when a client is entering a password. This is non-trivial, DO NOT ALLOW THIS!
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd
Am I the only Slashdot reader old enough (and a porn consumer for long enough) to know the history of child porn laws?
It's amazing how many times I've needed to post something like: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1790178&cid=33671018
Do you have any evidence that he's guilty, or are you just convicting him because the FBI raided him? Because you're sure acting as if he's guilty.