Prison Is For Dangerous Criminals, Not Hacktivists

In late 2011, defense contractor Stratfor suffered a cybersecurity breach that resulted in a leak of millions of internal emails. A few months later, the FBI arrested hacktivist Jeremy Hammond and several others for actions related to the breach. Hammond pleaded guilty to one count of violating the CFAA, and today his sentence was handed down: 10 years in prison followed by three years of supervised release. He said, [The prosecutors] have made it clear they are trying to send a message to others who come after me. A lot of it is because they got slapped around, they were embarrassed by Anonymous and they feel that they need to save face." Reader DavidGilbert99 adds, "Former LulzSec and Anonymous member Jake Davis argues that U.S. lawmakers need to take a leaf out of the U.K.'s legal system and not put Jeremy Hammond behind bars for his part in the hack of Stratfor. 'Jeremy Hammond has a lot to give society too. Prisons are for dangerous people that need to be segmented from the general population. Hackers are not dangerous, they are misunderstood, and while disciplinary action is of course necessary, there is nothing disciplined about locking the door on a young man's life for 10 years.'"

Comments

Sorry, but not here

[i kan reed]

Here we have prison to punish people. It doesn't exist as a means to control risk by controlling dangerous people. We've collectively decided that we should put people in cells(and let them be raped) like it's telling 5 year olds to stand in the corner.

Re:Sorry, but not here

[Joce640k]

Worse: The really, really bad people in prison enjoy having all these non-violent young men in there to torture and rape. It's like handing them lollipops.

Re:Sorry, but not here

[Anonymous Coward]

Here where I live, prisons are privatized, with an extremely strong lobby. If a DA doesn't throw the book at defendants, they get replaced next election by one that will. If a judge doesn't rubber-stamp maximum sentences and keep a high conviction ratio, they also get voted out. Even the local police have "quotas" where they have to slap cuffs on x amount of people per outing or they end up being passed up for promotions by people with better arrest tallies.

So, prisons are not for punishment; they are for profit. If you look at the two private prison companies, they actually have Apple-like growth in the past few years, with no upper bound in sight.

Ironic this... even China is getting rid of its work/re-education camps, while we are getting them here in the US.

Re:Sorry, but not here

[jellomizer]

Well having a 5 year old stand in the corner does have a purpose more then just punishment.
Normally when a 5 year old gets into trouble it is because they are over stimulated and over excited, and act without thinking. Having them go to the corner puts them in an environment with less stimulation, and lets them calm down a bit.

However Prison doesn't have that effect, there is too much stimulation, and hardens the criminal. This is appreciate for people who are too dangerous to be in public, either because their crimes are dangerous, or are at a high risk of repeating the crime in public. However for a lot of these crimes that people get locked up in, isn't really worth it for them. House Arrest, where their movements are tracts and they can only go to designated places, is one good option. Monetary fines work too, and for some people, just getting yelled at is enough.

The US has this tough on crime mentality, which doesn't work, and all it does is increase fear of the general public of getting put in jail for some petty crime they didn't really think things threw.

Re:Sorry, but not here

[xevioso]

I'm not concerned with whether they are good people or bad people. Prison serves multiple purposes. You can look at it as a place to try to institutionalize people, so they won't do whatever they did when they get out, because they, in theory, won't want to go back. You can look at it as punishment.

None of those things really matter. Prison is, first and foremost, a place to put people away so they will be unable to do what they did again in society. I simply don't care about the other reasons. Looking at it from that perspective, you could probably put this person in a minimum security prison for a long time; I doubt he's being sent to San Quentin.

Re:Sorry, but not here

[i kan reed]

No one should ever have a government incentive to promote crime. Privatized prisons are exactly that. But enough of a radical that I believe that all government work should be direct hires, and that government contracts and privatization in general are a failure.

Re:Sorry, but not here

[Anonymous Coward]

The worse criminal you are, the less punishment prison actually is. In the words of Richard Speck: "If they knew what a good time I was having, they'd turn me loose."

Re:Sorry, but not here

[Joce640k]

We really need to take a look at which countries successfully release prisoners who go on to lead lawful, fruitful lives, and then emulate those systems.

Won't work.

Not so long as being "tough on crime" wins votes.

Re:Sorry, but not here

[Anonymous Coward]

One can tell a lot about a country in how they treat the people that they can't stand, be it prisoners or "terrorists".

As a US citizen, it is just shameful. However, the lobby of "why spend money on a convicted murderer, he should be punished" is very strong here.

The problem is that there is a point when punishment turns into an attack, similar to the difference between a spanking versus flaying skin off with barbed wire. A punishment creates respect. An attack creates contempt, fear, and anger which has a blowback effect.

If for some reason I had the ability to rework the penal system here in the US, it would be along the lines of what even Eastern Europe has done:

1: Most prisons are warehouses. This would change to factories and farms. Before the 1980s, most prisons had their own farms and were fairly self-sufficient. Now, food has to be imported in [1]. Great for sub-contractors, destroys the purpose of the prison. Instead, there needs to be something for prisoners to do other than gas COs or flood tiers.

2: Make it "un-cool" to act up. US prisons, it is viewed as an achievement to get the four-point bed or the restraint chair. In Europe, the same behavior is looked upon as pure idiocy by other inmates.

3: Give something to work for, be it a university, or a GED, or heck, just the basic ability to read and write at the level of a sixth-grader.

4: Some real-world job training. A prison intranet perhaps with no access to the outside world and some sites mirrored.

5: Arrests and trivial convictions would be private. Only felonies would be public record. This way, some guy who gets drunk and is slurped up for PI by the local popo doesn't have a rap sheet.

6: Jails would be relegated to two functions. One is a place to house (not punish) defendants waiting for their trial date, the second is to deal with the convicted. Some jails punish all inside, and that should not be the case unless the US wants to go Italy's route of "guilty until proven innocent."

7: The punishment would fit the crime. Killing someone's career means that the person is a ward of the state for the rest of their lives, and so is their family. Keeping them earning money means more revenue from taxes.

8: Private prisons will not go away anytime soon. Instead, the companies would be given contracts to build schools and libraries, so their bread and butter does not depend on how many beds are filled. This way, there is no pressure on judges to convict or else be removed from office next election.

9: Actual mental health care. Right now, if someone is mentally ill, there are no hospitals for that. They end up in the psycho cellblock in the local jail.

[1]: In Texas, this seemed to be deliberate. Look up Vita-Pro for example.

Re:Sorry, but not here

[girlintraining]

The worse criminal you are, the less punishment prison actually is.

It may be a punishment, but it's not a deterrent of any kind, in even the slightest. The fact is that most crimes are crimes of opportunity. Most offenders are first-time. They made a bad call, and they got busted. But our lack of focus on rehabilitation, the fact that somewhere around 80% of Americans are now near or below poverty guideline according to recent reports coming out now, suggests that the major motivator of criminal activity today is desperation. And we reward them for our society's lackluster economic performance, high expectations, taxes, and cost of living, pushing them to do it, by taking away any future potential to get a real job. Every job that pays much more than minimum wage requires a background check. If you have ever even been arrested, let alone charged with a crime, chances are good you will not get any job, regardless of qualifications, that's any better than burger flipping, telemarketing, or cleaning rich people's houses.

And you know what that does? It pushes them into more crime. Prisons might as well be named Crime University. Everyone who's in will tell you there schemes. You go in for check fraud, and you come out knowing fifty new types of fraud, and no job prospects. It leads to one, inevitable conclusion.

And people wonder why the whole goddamned country is falling down all around us? It's easy: We're a good Christian country. And as a good christian country, we punish and oppress, we guilt, we lie, and we shit on the poor and downtrodden, while offering them token charity and telling ourselves they're morally weak and thus deserve what's done to them. We turn a blind eye to the suffering of others.

And then we wonder why record numbers of them are snapping, grabbing a gun, and going around shooting up schools, hospitals, and every other place where people congregate and there's a government presence. Because we don't let anyone cry, we don't help anyone who asks for it, and because they can't cry tears, and can't find help, they cry bullets, and find an outlet for their anger in the blood of innocent people.

Re:Sorry, but not here

[nickserv]

The USA's engine is money. Call it capitalism. Somewhere the idea was coined; "Anything for money.". Because they don't understand what capitalism is really about or why it would work. So, there are a great many schemes in the country revolving around income. Crime is a booming industry, ask any commercial prison. You can find them everywhere.

Not just money but control. There's no way to rule innocent people. The only power government has is the power to crack down on criminals. When there aren't enough criminals, they must be made. This is done by making so many things a crime it becomes impossible for people to live without breaking laws.

Should have been a VP

[wiredlogic]

If only he was a bank VP. Then all crimes are forgiven with a sizable bonus.

Prisons need to be fixed before patents

[metrix007]

There are so many problems with prisons in this country it's not funny.

Lets see...

• Non dangerous criminals go to prison and become hardened criminals, instead of being punished in a suitable way and giving back to the community
• Those scary hackers and pirates get more prison time than rapists and in some caes murderers
• You can go to prison for teaching someone how to beat a lie detector test. That is essentially a travesty because of what it indicates
• Prison is used a a deterrent, so far too often the punishment does not fit the crime or anywhere near it. Justice indeed.
• Prison is meant to be about rehabilitation, in part. If someone is released back into society, they are considered rehabilitated. Yet, they lose the right to vote.

I'm sure there's more....

Re:Fuck off

[aeranvar]

I don't see anyone saying that hackers aren't criminals or that Jeremy Hammond didn't deserve to go to prison. What they're saying is that criminals and dangerous people are sets that overlap, but that don't totally overlap. Or, another way to put it: Criminals aren't dangerous. Dangerous criminals are dangerous. Some hackers might be dangerous. Some hackers might not be dangerous. For hackers that are dangerous, 10 years in prison might be appropriate. For hackers that aren't dangerous, like those engaged in political protest, 10 years in prison is overkill.

They are dangerous criminals..

[Anonymous Coward]

The difference, of course, is dangerous to who?

Being dangerous to authority is much worse than being dangerous to the public, and is treated accordingly.

Re:Fuck off

[smooth wombat]

then the insecure system is what is dangerous, not the alleged criminal.

There is no alleging about it. People who deliberately break into someone else's systems are criminals. By your logic if I leave my door unlocked and you walk in and steal my stuff, I'm the one at fault. Nice way to blame the victim. Do I need to drag out the rape example?

"white collar crimes"

[bmajik]

I think there's an argument to be made that people who commit assaults or other acts of violence against others are an entirely different class of individual than people who run pyramid schemes, hack web sites, etc.

There -is- an aspect of prison that says "we're going to keep this person out of society for a while as a way to protect society". Taking phones/internet away from a cracker is more than sufficient to protect society, and arguably is a significant punitive action against someone with the time/skills/interests to be successful.

People who commit mail fraud or steal long distance shouldn't share cell space with sex predators, murderers, etc. It's not in the interests of society, the individuals in question, or any efforts at reforming criminals prior to re-introduction to society.

What's going to happen to a nerd in prison is that they'll do anything possible to survive. Historically, hackers have joined up with mafia or gangs for _physical_ protection, and in exchange, provide black-hat services to the groups providing them with protection.

This is NOT how you reform geeks. This plunges them deeper into the realm of criminal enterprise, with higher stakes, and more damage to everyone.

No, you fuck off

[deanklear]

You steal my personal data, sell it to someone else who uses that data to commit crimes, you are a dangerous person.

When Google and Facebook do this for a profit, hide the data collection behind an EULA, and then sell your personal data to third parties, they are called geniuses and made billionaires.

Furthermore, the individual in question did not seek to make a profit. You can disagree with his methods, but back when the scales of justice were still capable of measuring anything at all, these sort of considerations were commonly implemented.

Stop trying to make excuses when people commit crimes. They're a criminal, pure and simple.

In 1750: "Stop making excuses for those who commit treason against the King. They are criminals, pure and simple."

In 1850: "Stop making excuses for those people who steal slaves under the guise of making them free. They are criminals, pure and simple."

In 1950: "Stop making excuses for those people who participate in race riots. They are criminals, pure and simple."

Legitimate power and systems of law do not justify themselves without some reasoning. So can you tell me why people who commit physical assaults, armed robberies, and sexual assaults should see less jail time that someone who made a copy of an email archive to try and expose overreach of our privatized military economy?

How is putting this individual in prison going to

1) repair the damage they are accused of
2) improve society at large
3) cost effectively return them to society

Questions 1-3 are routinely ignored because the American incarceration system is not designed to help American society. It causes more harm than good, has shoved millions of people into a cycle of poverty and violence that few escape from, and the costs (upwards of 60-100k per prisoner per year) to perpetuate the broken system are far more than simpler, more humane justice systems found throughout the industrialized world.

This is not 1600. America is not a puritan state. Keep your dead ideas about corporal punishment in the distant past where they belong.

Re:"misunderstood"?

[Matheus]

Maybe, maybe not. As mentioned in a previous comment, prison is primarily used as a punishment here not as much for protection of general society. In a country founded on the principal of various innate freedoms taking away someone's freedom seems the ultimate punishment. Fines = Taking your means to buy what you want = Taking your freedom to acquire. Revocation of licenses (drivers, professional) take away your freedom to legally perform certain activities. Prison, and the associated probation/parole system, go steps farther by explicitly removing all, or almost all, but your barest freedoms. Execution takes your final freedom (Life) away.

Personally I think a 10 year sentence is pretty excessive. Your average privileged American is pretty shell shocked by even small amounts of time behind bars. Months to a couple years is enough of a penalty to reform the vast majority. Those that don't fit that mold become repeat offenders where the penalties deservedly go up. Extreme example: I could walk out of my office right now and gun down someone in cold blood and I wouldn't end up with 10 years. I don't disagree at all with Prison being the style of punishment but I find the duration to be excessive and honestly for first offense pending aggravating circumstances a friendly prosecutor would probably be happy with a number of years of probation in-lieu of. The whole concept of "Trying to send a message" is an abortion of our legal system and should be weeded out with appropriate diligence.

PS: The whole misunderstood argument is similarly BS. I break laws all the time and when I get caught I pay the price. I am truly understood by only myself but that is no argument that I shouldn't be judged based on the same laws my fellow citizens are. I instead work to change those laws I disagree with so I can spread my own understanding.