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Pirate Bay Co-Founder In Solitary Confinement
pigrabbitbear writes "Things aren't looking awesome for Pirate Bay founder Gottfrid Svartholm, who's currently under lock and key in a newly built jail about 15 minutes north of Stockholm. Svartholm's mother Kristina says that her 28-year-old son is being held in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day without any human contact other than his interactions with the guards. It's been nearly two months since Svartholm was arrested in Cambodia, where he'd been living for years, and extradited back to Sweden, where he's due to spend a year behind bars and pay a $1.1 million fine for copyright offenses related to his role at the Pirate Bay. But that's not why Sweden's being so tough on him in prison. Authorities believe he may have played a role in the hacking of Logica, a Swedish technology company with ties to the country's tax authorities. They haven't charged him with any crimes yet in that case, however."
Take that pixel thief
This is insane, why is a computer programmer under solitary confinement?
If so, then that would be crossing the line.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
So a man is languishing in solitary confinement for years, not allowed visitors, and is mistreated to a degree that if he were a prisoner of war it would be considered a war crime under the Geneva convention, without being charged, given a trial, or given an opportunity to defend himself... and when this man is finally released, they'll be sending him back to jail because he enabled people to download music and movies... and he's only in that country because of the aforementioned.
Does that seem right to you?
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
this guy offended power but didn't stay anonymous, so he was nailed
unless you are rich and powerful expect the machinery of society to be turned against you if you ever upset the rich and powerful
what we need is an anonymous, distributed internet
freenet and tor are both good starts but too hard to use for normal people
now is the time to start building it, when the regular people rely on the conveniences of the internet but don't yet feel the restrictions on their freedoms
if there is no alternative built by the time they do feel it and look for one then we will have lost
learn how to configure and run a freenet and tor node on an old computer in your house, throttle the bandwidth if you want to and don't run an exit node if that is scary
but run a node, you can be part of the solution
look at http://project-byzantium.org/ if you are feeling more adventurous
Really? Am I missing something about why this is necessary? Otherwise, it seems to be an act of vengeful spite or an unreasonable fear of computer technology?
Yesterday's Weirdness is Tomorrow's Reason Why
Logica is owned by CGI, it's canadian company now.
There are no atheists when recovering from tape backup.
In other news, recent financial transcripts show record donations by both the RIAA and MPAA to Swedish re-election campaigns.
But that's not why Sweden's being so tough on him in prison. Authorities believe he may have played a role in the hacking of Logica, a Swedish technology company with ties to the country's tax authorities.
What does it matter if there was another crime? Of course he should be tried and prosecuted if he committed a crime, but to give someone solitary confinement before he's even been charged for a non-violent crime seems completely excessive. If your justice system has people leaving it more dangerous and damaged when they came in, you are doing it wrong.
I suppose that not every country has an innocent until guilty system though, is this usual in Sweden?
Torrents are the modern day The Library of Alexandria.
By law, every book and scroll was copied.
It was critical for the development of civilization.
A golden age lasted until the christians and muslims destroyed it.
Don't let the plutocrats destroy our library!
hard to believe anything they say after watching how the swedish government acts.
Of course, he has not been charged with any crime, so "if so" would be an overstatement. I might as well say, "nurb432 decapitated a 12 year old girl and drank her blood? If so then that would be crossing the line."
(But you probably would not face as severe a punishment for that crime as for running something like TBP...)
Palm trees and 8
Am I the only one who finds it horrific to use intense psychological tactics like this in such a case? What sort of permanent damage might be caused by long term isolation like this? For what purpose? Is there some loss of life or other high impact event they hope to prevent by sweating information out of this guy? Geez.
Glad to see your government is doing what it is told. Good dog. Sit, stay.
Honestly everyone there should be up in arms angry as to how they are handling this. Why are you people doing my country's bidding?
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
23 hours a day, in a cell by yourself - but with tv, visitors, reading materials, and an hour outside to exercise and get some fresh air... sounds like a pretty standard prison accommodation, except he gets a private cell. (Which, incidentally, is far better than being fresh ass-meat for a prison gang.)
"Solitary confinement" would suggest that he's not allowed contact with anybody but prison staff, which is demonstrably false because the prisoner's mother reports that she knows exactly where he is, sees him regularly, and that he's doing well - healthy and in good spirits. So, he's in a private cell, he gets an hour of exercise a day (pretty standard), and he has access to reading materials, and visitors. That's NOT solitary confinement.
The title of this article would be much better as, "Pirate Bay Founder wants pen pals while he's relaxing in a private cell."
... Stockholm Syndrome.
Solitary confinement isn't same as in US prisons. First of all he isn't in a prison where it would be strange if he was held in solitary confinement. Everyone who gets 'häktad' is held in solitary confinement or the "red" ward until the prosecutor says otherwise or he is officially charged (i.e. "förundersökningssekretess" is released).
I've been myself confined in solitary for 2 months, where 2 weeks were voluntary. It's good times and way better than sharing a cell with some douche bags and being able to relax because the psycho in your cell is about to get a psychosis and can't take being locked in.
In solitary confinement you get bed, PRIVACY, tv (if officially charged, or prosecutor allows i.e. after giving your sworn statement), table, toilet, water, foodstuff, books and library visit, paper and pen, access to phone (with permission of prosecutor), training room, shower, and so on. It's not the american "solitary confinement" nor is it to punish you, it's way more costly, and they try to put you into "GREEN" ward asap. After that you'll be sent to prison where there is place for you, and if you are unlucky, you get to be 3 or more in one cell.
There is a different type of solitary confinement that I doubt Gottfried is put in, and they usually only exist in prisons and people dangerous to themselves.
BTW, I never been to prison. Just accused of crap. Gottfried should be happy he is put in "häkte" because when he goes to prison he'll love the solitary confinement benefits. Only negative is of course that you only get to meet the wardens and a few people the prosecutor wetted before letting them see you (and they can be friends not necessarily family).
Exactly. This is being portrayed as some "Cool Hand Luke" scenario where he gets a night in the box "cause that's how he wants it". When you're in prison not getting to mix with other prisoners is a feature, not a problem.
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
It isn't that hard to see the reason is pure vindictiveness on the part of (monied) rights holders, exercising their purchased cronies in world government.
If you followed the press releases surrounding the pirate bay, and bothered to read their "legal threats" page before they were busted, you would know that the founders of the pirate bay frequently and bluntly told the large media companies to go fuck themselves with collapsable metal batons. (And even gave suggestions about which ones were of superior quality.)
[No seriously. They really did.]
This tidbit was alluded to discreetly by various media groups covering the trial, since their peers had made open complaints to the court about the group's lack of tact and seeming lack of seriousness, demanding harsher punishments. (Essentially, they didn't like being told to go fuck themselves, and wanted the court system to use 'harsher' punishments, because they were butt-hurt over it, illistrating their own lack of professionalism in the matter.)
The outright illegal raid on PB servers, followed by the dubious cambodian extradition to sweden, and the endless trail of clearly damning evidence of government corruption in the case pretty clearly sums it up.
Do I think the guy is a hero? Certainly not. Is he getting unfairly punished in proportion to his crimes? Oh yes, certainly. Is it due to government corruption? The evidence is pretty damning...
What is he really guilty of that they want to punish him so severely?
He threatened their hegemony, and was shamelessly unafrad of him. They can't stand that, and want to use him as a poster child to instill fear in people that would be like him, and flaunt their authority.
More than anything, I'd say he is a political prisoner, on par with what the russians do routinely.
If you flout their rules, AND THEY CATCH YOU, expect to find yourself in solitary confinement.
Moral of the story: don't get caught.
-or-
Have sensible rules.
Futurist Traditionalism
It's like people invent computers and then decide to throw out justice in the process...
The act of caging any individual without a high probability of recidivism, is essentially spite. It is a form of archaic, wanton penalization probably not even presumed to have any preventive or rehabilitative effect past its end. More practical would be an imposed condition for a ruled duration that would make repeating the crime wildly unlikely or impossible -- preferably while improving rather than weakening the subject. A cage is an efficient method of preventing people from doing anything that cannot be done in a cage with the limited resources at hand. Under typical conditions beyond basic toiletries and tattered books (if they are so lucky), such resources are their own forms and little more, thus leaving violence, idleness and anticipation of food as the majority of very few options. Solitary confinement might actually be more widely practiced for the betterment of society, but only for the violent or voluntary. Otherwise, it makes little sense unless one thinks like a criminal their self.
I have never observed any value (beyond monetary) in caging anyone who poses no imminent threat to themselves or society. However, as displayed by the practice, it is not ethics that guide such tyrannical policies; it is often pettiness, laziness, or profit. The cage is the gangrene that handicaps society -- by placing problems out of sight and out of mind, sweeping them under the carpet to fester and haunt us any time but now. But it haunts us now despite.
Of course the answer to this comes from the very fiends who cultivate this gangrenous rot. In the US especially, prison-labor is on the rise like never before. Next time you eat your potatoes, you might ponder what crime the man who harvested them committed.
Forward! -- Emperor Norton, 2012
And this is exactly the reason why Julian Assange is so (wisely) set against being extradited to Sweden.
I could never imagine how fast will the "content industry" bring upon us a totalitarian, corporatist dystopia. The US is pushing for extradition of people who engaged in copying - not violent attacks, not murder, not kidnapping, not arms or drugs dealing, no, nothing but fucking COPYING copyrighted content.
The only thing more alarming is the great majority of sheeple, I mean people, watching all this and going "oh well, I guess Bono's got to buy food, too". Pathetic.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Don't fuck with big corporations.
You get thrown in jail and the key thrown away.
The upside-down world: a co-founder of Pirate Bay is in solitary, but the guys who stole $18 trillion in the 2007-08 economic collapse scam are running around free and using their cash to influence the US election.
You are welcome on my lawn.
This treatment is a clear violation of his human rights. Sweden state should be sued over this treatment to ECJ. Since Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union is part of Lisbon Treaty that Sweden has agreed to. I am not sure where the first one might be sued to. But that might be European Court of Human Rights.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Convention_on_Human_Rights
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charter_of_Fundamental_Rights_of_the_European_Union
would have approved of anyone hacking the tax man!
That court decision was made during the socialist autarky period of India. Equality before the law is socialism in/of the judiciary. The world can no longer afford that any more. It's UNSUSTAINABLE!
23/7 Solitary Confinement is cruel and unusual, and designed with the express purpose of torturing an inmate into submission.
How any court can hold that "segregation" is compatible with the 8th Amendment is beyond me, and I would think that Europe would be much farther long in eliminating such punishment.
But that's not why Sweden's being so tough on him in prison. Authorities believe he may have played a role in the hacking of Logica, a Swedish technology company with ties to the country's tax authorities. They haven't charged him with any crimes yet in that case, however."
Oh, I see- on the SUSPICION he MIGHT have done something to fuck with your tax system, he deserves solitary confinement. Has he been charged with such? NO. Has he been convicted of such? NO. They just think he did it. ASSHOLES. FUCK YOU. Get off your knees and stop sucking the MPAA and RIAA's dick.
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
I wondered why, on waking up thus morning, I felt safer - as if a great threat had been removed from the world. Well done, Sweden, and may I compliment your recent applications of extradition. I know Ben Stiller can rely upon you to execute international justice if anyone should slate his movies.
-- Using the preview button since 2005
They should fear the ones they dont ever hear about. They are, however our unsung heroes, well never know their names, never truly know their actions, but theyre making our world a better place, you can rest assured of that.
How do I know? Truth be told - I dont.