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Former Student Gets 30 Months For Political DDoS Attacks
wiredmikey writes "A former University of Akron student was sentenced Friday to 30 months in prison, followed by 3 years of supervised release for conducting denial of service attacks on the sites of several prominent conservative figures as well as infecting several systems with botnet software. Mitchell L. Frost, age 23, of Bellevue, Ohio admitted that between August 2006 and March 2007, he initiated denial of service attacks on web servers hosting the sites of political commentators, including Bill O'Reilly, Rudy Giuliani, Ann Coulter, and others."
That's seriously warped. Yes, what he did was wrong, but it's not like he permanently shut down the Internet.
30 months? Two and a half years? Damn, he should have just raped someone instead, he probably would have gotten less time and had a lot more fun in the process. I swear, I'm going to start voting against any politician that runs on being "tough on crime." It seems plenty tough enough as it is.
Two and a half years of someone's life, that's the price we demand now for some minor inconvenience? Damn, if I were his lawyer, I'd be tempted to appeal that for violation of the Eighth Amendment.
Yeah. I saw guys in the feds who were doing 20 years because someone else committed a crime and they knew about it. I know a limo driver now at Elkton who picked up a fare at JFK, the DEA pulled them over and found the fare's bags stuffed with cocaine and meth. The driver knew nothing about it, denied all knowledge, and went to trial with a public defender. He got 37 years and lost his appeal, and does not have the money for collateral attack. Did you know that after one appeal, you must now use civil remedies, like 28USC 2241 and 2255, and you are NOT entitled to counsel for them?
I did five years for what most would call, at best, a silly prank that hurt no one and caused neither property or financial loss.
"The pie shall be cut in half and each man shall receive.....death. I'll eat the pie."
According to 18 USC 3553 the judge MUST consider the issue of disparate punishment. So the judge does. And does what he/she wants anyway.
It's a HUGE business, the prison industry, and it needs a steady flow of bodies, which it easily gets.
"The pie shall be cut in half and each man shall receive.....death. I'll eat the pie."
You know, you can look it up in PACER... ;) It's northern district of Ohio, case no. 10-cr-00216. He plead guilty to "counts 1 and 2" of the information (which I can't load, it's restricted).
This is from the *defense* counsel's sentencing brief: "Mitchell Frost . . . knowingly transmitted computer programs, codes, commands, and information which caused an interruption and otherwise disruption of vulnerable internet web sites, obtain passwords, account information, and other identifying information, causing a loss in excess of $5000.00. Through the use of mal-ware, Mitchell Frost also during this time knowingly possessed 15 or more counterfeit or unauthorized access devices, including 136 credit card accounts, PINs, and security codes, and close to 3000 user names and passwords for various computer systems or networks."
He got self-surrender, which suggests to me he may get a camp; he's serving less than 120 months, didn't get convicted of fraud involving telephones, and is otherwise not a security risk (deportable alien, etc)...
geek. lawyer.
Nothing was taken or lost.
Sure it was. Time and money were taken from the targeted sites and their hosting/bandwidth providers. Downtime does not have a non-zero cost in the commercial setting.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.