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US Attorney Chided Swartz On Day of Suicide
theodp writes "The e-mail that Defendant Swartz's supplemental memorandum (pdf) cites as paramount to his fifth motion to suppress [evidence against him] is relevant, but not nearly as important as he tries to make it out to be,' quipped United States Attorney Carmen M. Ortiz (pdf) in a court filing made on the same day Aaron Swartz committed suicide. In the 1-7-2011 e-mail Ortiz refers to, which was not produced for Swartz until Dec. 14th — almost two years after his 1-6-2011 arrest — a Secret Service agent reported to the Assistant U.S. Attorney that he was 'prepared to take custody anytime' of Swartz's laptop, although no one had yet sought a warrant to search the computer. In Prosecutor as Bully, Larry Lessig laments, 'They [JSTOR] declined to pursue their own action against Aaron, and they asked the government to drop its. MIT, to its great shame, was not as clear, and so the prosecutor had the excuse he needed to continue his war against the "criminal" who we who loved him knew as Aaron.' Swartz's family also had harsh words for MIT and prosecutors: 'Decisions made by officials in the Massachusetts U.S. Attorney's office and at MIT contributed to his death. The US Attorney's office pursued an exceptionally harsh array of charges, carrying potentially over 30 years in prison, to punish an alleged crime that had no victims. Meanwhile, unlike JSTOR, MIT refused to stand up for Aaron.' With MIT President Emeritus Charles M. Vest currently serving as a Trustee of JSTOR parent Ithaka as well as a Trustee of The MIT Corporation, one might have expected MIT to issue a statement similar to the let's-put-this-behind-us one JSTOR made on the Swartz case back in 2011."
Yes, poor me, poor us the victims of u.s aggression.
U.S starves a million Iraqi's through sanctions(poor us the people boo hoo),
U.S kills democratic leaders around the world and installs dictators that leads to thousands of man, women, and children dead(poor us the people boo hoo),
U.S starts a war based on lies against the Iraqi's which leads to hundreds of thousands dead(poor us the people boo hoo),
U.S and their overzealous drug policies punish and imprison people for years making them work for pennies in prison because it's not right to get high(poor us the people boo hoo)
U.S and their sick policies have left millions dead in the middle east for the past 3 decades and hundreds of thousands including south america(poor us the people boo hoo)
U.S law enforcement have killed 100's for the past 2 decades and also abused it's citizens and yet the Colorado and Connecticut shootings call for banning firearms for u.s citizens(poor us the people boo hoo)
The u.s is very damn corrupt as any other government in the world because it's run by people. When people get into any office or law enforcement some primitive instinct triggers in their brain and now they think they are above everybody else and that they can abuse you and break the laws, including prosecutors who want to make a name for themselves by sending 18 year old johnny to prison for the rest of his life for smoking a joint.
We need a fourth branch of government run just by the people to monitor the activities of the other 3 branches because our government right now isn't working anymore.