Comment by PhasmaFelis
12 years ago
Uh huh, but the prosecutor threatened him with 30 to try and scare him into bargaining, and Swartz apparently believed him, so I'm not sure what your point is.
12 years ago
Uh huh, but the prosecutor threatened him with 30 to try and scare him into bargaining, and Swartz apparently believed him, so I'm not sure what your point is.
This is also totally false. Any competent attorney understands how charges group under federal sentencing law; not only was he not facing a 30 year sentence, he could not face a 30 year sentence.
Swartz had competent legal representation from the jump. His counsel at the time of his suicide wrote in a postmortem on the case that he believed Swartz stood little chance of any custodial sentence, even were he to be convicted. It's not hard to see why: the sentencing guidelines for first-time offenders of non-remunerative CFAA offenses aren't very demanding.
Swartz was likely to be ruined by the cost of defending a complex federal charge, faced the prospect of potentially spending months in federal prison, and an overall likelihood of the whole incident concluding with a felony conviction on his record, which may have been problematic for his future endeavors. He was oppressed by his prosecution in a variety of ways. It's unnecessary to manufacture new ways.
Ass.