
Ortiz says suicide will not change handling of cases - chaostheory
http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/local_coverage/2013/01/ortiz_says_suicide_will_not_change_handling_cases
======
olefoo
If you haven't already. Today is a very good day to write your Representative
<http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/>

And your Senators
[http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_c...](http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm)

And ask them why this person is allowed to wield the full might and power of
the US Government.

If you want to ensure that this gets attention it's a matter of sustained
pressure, and of getting both houses of Congress to ask the embarrassing and
obvious questions of the Justice department.

~~~
ChuckMcM
And a pretty easy way to send your congress critter a post card is
<http://postcongress.io>

That said, one wonders which audience Ms. Ortiz is attempting to court with
this stance.

~~~
tlrobinson
Are paper letters still taken more seriously than emails by most
congresspeople?

~~~
rexreed
This is because writing letters and making phone calls takes (sometimes
marginal, but still) more effort than sending an email.

~~~
jrockway
Why does the amount of effort I put into communicating with my elected
representatives matter? If my view is worth taking seriously, it should be
taken seriously regardless of whether I email or snail mail him.

After all, it's not much effort to vote for his opponent at the next election.

~~~
biot
This is why men should Fedex engagement rings to their prospective fiancées.
After all, it's the thought that counts not whether the act involves a
romantic evening culminating in a bent-knee proposal vs. tearing open a
delivery box alone in her apartment.

~~~
jrockway
Your example is invalid because the power dynamic is reversed. If someone
doesn't like the way you give them an engagement ring, they can ditch you and
get another fiance. But in the case of mailing your Congressperson, it's _you_
that can ditch the current Congressperson by electing a new one.

~~~
biot
My point wasn't about the power dynamic but rather the perception of
effort/thought/care. Even though the message is the same, whether it's "Will
you marry me?" or "Will you consider this political stance?", the perception
around the delivery of the message is still taken into account.

Writing a physical letter introduces a barrier of effort which separates a two
minute slap-out-an-email rant from a carefully composed and considered letter.
Imagine if commenting on YouTube required writing a letter? The quality of
comments would increase by many orders of magnitude.

~~~
ChuckMcM
I am _so_ going to suggest that on the YouTube help desk.

~~~
biot
It would make for a great new feature to be announced, say... at the beginning
of April. :)

------
FireBeyond
This is bringing the worst out of HN. In this thread alone, I've read people
claiming that it's unequivocal fact that Swartz committed suicide because of
his prosecution, because his lawyer said so, but that we can't trust a single
word out of Ortiz's mouth... because she's a lawyer.

We have people claiming, in specific terms, that the US Attorneys as a whole
have an interest in encouraging defendant's to commit suicide...

This is hardly the first article to demonstrate this, and there are certainly
many valid issues to be reviewed and discussed, but many commenters here are
demonstrating that we're just as capable of turning into a lynch mob as anyone
else.

~~~
enraged_camel
>>We have people claiming, in specific terms, that the US Attorneys as a whole
have an interest in encouraging defendant's to commit suicide...

This is a strawman and nobody here has said it. The actual argument is that
prosecutors have very strong incentives to put as much pressure as possible on
defendants, and the latter most often cannot defend themselves because the
process is so extraordinarily expensive. As a result, the defendant either has
to settle for a plea bargain or lose the trial. Unfortunately, many times they
take the third option, which is suicide.

Make no mistake: this isn't about Ortiz. This is a systemic problem.

~~~
jack-r-abbit
_> >>>We have people claiming, in specific terms, that the US Attorneys as a
whole have an interest in encouraging defendant's to commit suicide...

>>This is a strawman and nobody here has said it._

Well... <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5092900>

~~~
enraged_camel
I think you are taking that comment out of context.

~~~
jack-r-abbit
That comment is in its entirety... and is in direct response to this
submission. I assume "they" is meant to be "Ortiz's office" aka "US
Attorneys". I'm not sure what context makes it so that the commenter is
suggesting something other than the US Attorneys encourage suicide.

~~~
enraged_camel
I interpreted it to mean that the actions of many US attorneys - motivated by
incentives to win as many cases as possible - push many defendants to commit
suicide. I don't think the poster genuinely meant that prosecutors literally
tell the defendant that considering the charges, he/she may as well off
himself/herself. THAT would be encouraging suicide.

~~~
jack-r-abbit
ok. So I'm not "out of context." We just have different interpretations of the
comment. I can live with that.

------
wisty
I wish more people were pissed off at plea bargaining. Yes, I know people
think, the US needs it. But there's plenty of countries without plea
bargaining (or at least, with a greatly reduced plea bargaining system). IMO,
it should simply result in a reduced sentence, at the discretion of the judge
(as evidence of remorse, not a reward for making the court's job easier).

The government doesn't threaten you with a bigger sentence if you refuse to be
unconstitutionally searched (if you tell the cops to come back if they get a
warrant). You don't get a smaller sentence for waiving your right to a
silence, or counsel. But you _do_ get a smaller sentence for waiving a right
to a fair trial. I can't really see how this is constitutional, but being
forced to waive other rights isn't.

Yes, things would be easier if criminals were coerced (by the threat of a
larger sentence) to let the police search them without a warrant, to answer
everything the police asked, to not to lawyer up, and to confess their guilt
without a trial. But it's not the way a free country works.

And you _are_ punished with stiffer sentences. If criminals are getting off
lightly (due to plea bargaining), then politicians will raise sentences. This
means people who do nothing more than demand a fair trial will receive stiffer
punishments than they deserve.

I can't see how a lack of fair trials serves justice either. It encourages
lazy police work. And an unfair process turns people against the system. If
people accept plea bargains, do they really see themselves a guilty, or simply
persecuted by "the system"?

~~~
josephlord
I largely agree with you though some sentence reduction for making the court's
life easier, avoiding the cost (emotional, time and financial) to witnesses
(including the victim) is appropriate it is a question of the magnitude. 10x
sentence difference is undue pressure that is enough to make the innocent
plead guilty (or worse). An expectation of 30%-50% sentence for pleading early
is a significant reduction but not in most cases enough to make an innocent
person plead guilty unless it crosses a threshold that allows a suspended
sentence or community punishment (in which case the magnitude of any improper
conviction is relatively low).

I'm in the UK were there is talk of cautiously introducing some form of plea
bargaining. At the moment I think pleading guilty (and how early it is done)
is just something taken into by the judge. There may be some deals on the
charges brought when there is some discretion but I don't think the
opportunities are that great.

------
cschmidt
"It may lead to the U.S. attorney’s office looking at each case on its own
merits."

What a concept: prosecuting each case on its own merits.

------
driverdan
With Ortiz's political aspirations this seems like the worst response she
could possibly make. It seems to me that the public would respond better to
something like "we'll review our practices to ensure we're best serving the
public." They could then just sweep it under the rug and wait for the public
to forget. If it came up again they could then they could issue a statement
along the lines of this one.

~~~
klibertp
I live far away from USA, so I don't know any specifics, but I happen to live
in a country where "the public" elected to power a party that openly tried to
transform a country into a police state. It's debatable what impact their time
in office had overall, but they gained popularity thanks to exactly the same
stance Ortiz presents here and maintained it (popularity) for three years
thanks to many similar cases. Granted, the victims were chosen much more
wisely - a doctor, a politician, a beggar, to name a few - but handling of
their cases was even worse, because they were used as a propaganda and
displayed in the media from the very beginning, along with a video of breaking
door and cuffing said doctor on the ground for example. The politician in
question even committed suicide when the police tried to arrest her, and we
were told that this was perfectly normal occurrence and that nothing is going
to change.

And this is perfectly normal, European country we're talking about...

So no, I don't think this is going to negatively impact Ortiz career, it's
possible that she's even saying this in hope of _gaining_ popularity.

I know this seems improbable, but then winning the election by said party
seemed improbable too in 2005 and then actually happened. It's easy to look at
one's social circle and think it represents "the public". Well, it most often
does not.

~~~
farabove
I guess Norway

~~~
jonhinson
My Google-fu leads me to say...Poland.

~~~
klibertp
I just spent half an hour trying to find a conclusive result in google using
just the data I included in the post and couldn't. Can you say what queries
you used to get to this guess? Were you completely unfamiliar with the matters
I described before attempting the search? What did you assume while searching?

I'm not saying you're right (or wrong) but I'm really interested in the
process.

~~~
jonhinson
Similar to sukuriant, I googled the name half of your email in your profile,
clicked on your Trello profile, copy&pasted the text from your first entry (I
did not recognize the language) into Google. Google Translate told me it was
Polish.

Also, on your twitter account (same username as on Trello), you mention Warsaw
a few times.

I was completely unfamiliar with the matters you mentioned in your comment.

~~~
klibertp
Ok, this is getting scary - the twitter account I used exactly once during a
hackathon a year ago (we were mining geolocation data from tweets...) and
since completely forgot. I try to control my online presence but it seems that
I need to get more serious with it unless I want such things to float around
forever. Thanks for explanation :)

------
wheelerwj
"We thought the case was reasonably handled and we would not have done things
differently."

How can a suicide of a 26 year old man under prosecution by your office not
warrant some sort of change? How can you not reflect and try for a better
outcome. To not change suggests that this was an acceptable outcome... which
is the point we are trying to make. Prosecution should not be so severe that
suicide is a viable alternative.

~~~
TylerE
The justice department is not in the healthcare business.

Let's not shy too far from the facts here. Aaron knew what he was doing was
breaking the law. He participated in an act of civil disobedience, that does
not grant freedom from consequences.

~~~
betterunix
"Aaron knew what he was doing was breaking the law. He participated in an act
of civil disobedience, that does not grant freedom from consequences."

Yes, it is obvious to anyone downloading academic papers that they are
committing _13_ crimes and could be imprisoned for the rest of their lives.
After all, changing your MAC address, hiding a laptop in a closet, and
ignoring JSTOR's TOS clearly add up to 13.

He should have read the law? Have _you_ read the law? Are you sure _you_
haven't committed any felonies today?

I seriously doubt that Aaron really considered the possibility of criminal
action for what he did, and certainly not so many charges that he could have
been legally imprisoned for the remainder of his adult life. A civil suit by
JSTOR would have been a reasonable expectation, and note what Aaron did when
faced with a civil suit: he returned a hard drive of files to JSTOR and
settled the matter, without any suicidal actions.

Your sort of reasoning -- that he allegedly broke the law, therefore no mercy
can be considered and the prosecutor was _right_ to harass him -- is one of
the most destructive far-right concepts to have been popularized in America.
It is the line of reasoning that leads to teams of soldiers attacking civilian
homes to serve a basic search-and-arrest warrant. It is the sort of reasoning
that opens the door to the crushing tyranny of overly broad laws and abuses of
the justice system. Allowing ourselves to fall victim to the logic that the
law is perfect and absolute, that prosecutors have a moral duty to enforce all
laws, opens us to a system where nobody is safe from the government.

~~~
TylerE
If he didn't think he was committing a crime why did he attempt to conceal his
identity?

If he had been accessing student's personal info, would you still be defending
him?

Unauthorized access is unauthorized access.

~~~
betterunix
"If he didn't think he was committing a crime why did he attempt to conceal
his identity?"

I did not say that he thought he was doing something entirely legal, I said
that he probably only expected a civil case for his actions, which is entirely
reasonable. If I had to guess, I would say that whatever attempt he made to
conceal his identity was done to ensure that he would not face a court order
to stop until he had finished what he had set out to do.

If you are saying that concealing one's identity is evidence that a person is
doing something criminal, then you are accusing a good friend of mine of being
a criminal. He used proxy servers to download large numbers of patents, as
part of his masters thesis project, to avoid bandwidth restrictions imposed by
servers. In the end, he developed a system that helps locate patents, and
could help people avoid violating patents or find prior art. Should he face a
50 year sentence too?

"If he had been accessing student's personal info, would you still be
defending him?"

He did nothing even remotely similar to that. His actions were as close to
accessing private information as posting to HN.

"Unauthorized access is unauthorized access."

His accessing was _not_ unauthorized. MIT's network is open to the public, and
JSTOR's archive is open to anyone on MIT's network. What access was
unauthorized in this case?

~~~
TylerE
From the JSTOR TOS:

(b) except as set forth in Section 2.1(e) and 5 of the Terms and Conditions
for Use for Journals, Plants, GIS Data, Select Other Content Types, and Data
for Research below, provide and/or authorize access to the Content available
through Individual Access, the Publisher Sales Service, or other programs to
persons or entities other than Authorized Users;

(d) undertake any activity such as computer programs that automatically
download or export Content, commonly known as web robots, spiders, crawlers,
wanderers or accelerators that may interfere with, disrupt or otherwise burden
the JSTOR server(s) or any third-party server(s) being used or accessed in
connection with JSTOR; or

(e) make any use, display, performance, reproduction, or distribution that
exceeds or violates these Terms and Conditions of Service and the Content-
Specific Terms and Conditions of Use.

~~~
betterunix
Oh, that's interesting, but so what? You must have missed this, which happened
before Aaron did anything related to JSTOR:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lori_Drew#Guilty_verdict_set_a...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lori_Drew#Guilty_verdict_set_aside)

------
malandrew
Personally, I'd love for Congress to permit the publication of all
correspondence done by the prosecution in this case. I want to know what was
written and discussed among the prosecutors (Ortiz, Heynman and others in that
office) and everyone else involved with this case (Secret Service). I think
the Internet will do a much better job of investigating prosecutorial
misconduct than any internal investigation could uncover.

Once someone assumes a public office they should assume they are now a public
good working for the betterment of the society that appointed them. One of the
rights, we the people, should have, is the ability to provide direct
oversight; maybe not in real time, but at least post hoc.

~~~
nonamegiven
"I'd love for Congress to permit the publication of all correspondence done by
the prosecution in this case."

Similar things have happened, although not always with the government's
enthusiastic cooperation:

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pentagon_Papers#Leak>

------
rdl
I don't think the suicide itself should change how cases are handled, but the
revelations about how inherently wrong the prosecution of Swartz was, should
change how cases are handled.

You absolutely don't want other cases or issues to be advanced through people
killing themselves, or threats of suicide.

You also don't want non-violent civil disobedience hacking to face $1.5mm in
legal costs, $1mm in fines, and 13 felony counts and multiple years in prison,
particularly when the injured party comes to a successful private resolution
with the offender.

Also, the cases in the future should not be handled by USA Ortiz of AUSA
Heymann, who should no longer be involved in the practice of law, particularly
not as employees and representatives of the people of the United States.

------
darklajid
Well.. Can she say something else? I mean - wouldn't any statement remotely
similar to "In light of the recent events we will think about our approach and
adapt our methods" basically admit guilt and having been wrong before?

In other words: Is this surprising, in any way?

~~~
wheelerwj
We are deeply distraught over the outcome of this case. We will be examining
our procedures to ensure that we acted correctly. Our duty to the American
people is to uphold justice for defendants as well as accusers. Mr. Swartz's
death leaves us having unfulfilled our obligation to both Mr. Swartz and the
American people and was not the intention of this office.

------
marssaxman
Of course not - that would be an admission that they did it wrong.

~~~
wheelerwj
How can they not admit they are wrong? A MAN DIED. something went wrong.

~~~
oh_sigh
Chronically depressed people commit suicide frequently. I'd be interested in
hearing your evidence that Aaron killed himself because of his prosecution,
besides from the mere coincidence of the two events.

~~~
thoughtcriminal
What a rediculous thing to say. We're past 1+1=2 now. We've moved on to
greater things. Try and keep up please.

~~~
oh_sigh
Great rebuttal. Filled with reason. A+. Great job keeping up

~~~
jlgreco
What you have asked for as been discussed _at considerable length_ already. If
you want to read that discussion, use the search field at the bottom to get
started. There is no sense in having that same conversation for the hundredth
time.

~~~
oh_sigh
Strange. I've been reading hackernews for years, and I don't remember any kind
of evidence ever being presented that Aaron killed himself because of the
prosecution, besides for the coincidince of the two events.

~~~
jlgreco
If you want to argue over it, you can do so somewhere more relevant,
preferably in one of the old threads where it has already been beaten to
death. It is clear there that a unanimous consensus is not going to arise on
the matter.

~~~
oh_sigh
I'll bring it up when ever it is relevant. The "Ortiz=Murderer" faction
doesn't get a free pass to make their outrageous claims simply because the
question has been discussed elsewhere.

------
aswanson
There is a non-trivial proportion of humanity that simply cannot change their
mind, cannot admit when they are wrong. If you think long enough about it and
follow a rule-based mindset absent objective feedback (as fields such as law
allow), you can justify almost any action taken ad-infinitum, as long as you
follow a rule book and pattern you have practiced for years. That said,
mentally inagile, cognitive calcified people should be culled from our justice
system ruthlessly. We need people who can think through proportion, harm, and
justice on a dynamic basis.

------
ck2
I am suddenly understanding the phrase

 _"Don't make a federal case out of it!"_

------
ericjeepn
"Many remark justice is blind; pity those in her sway, shocked to discover she
is also deaf."

~DAVID MAMET, Faustus

------
tomjen3
Of course not. Psychopaths don't care about what happens to others, only to
themselves.

------
linuxhansl
She's toast and she knows it. She's trying to save her political career.

It doesn't even matter anymore whether she's right or wrong. Personally I feel
that she mishandled this case (and that the whole system is pretty messed up),
but the truth is somewhere between the two positions we keep hearing.

------
arbuge
Precisely why she, and all prosecutors like her, need to go. They can't change
- indeed, they can't find or admit fault with their unjust methods.

------
philprx
Adding insult to injury. Wow... nice, Department of _Justice_. Do that apply
to justice to the dead to respect their memory?

------
ChristianMarks
Not only won't they admit wrong doing, but they will encourage suicides
wherever possible.

------
jijji
She should be disbarred for ethics violations.

------
WalterSear
Whatever you say, "Baghdad" Ortiz.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad_Saeed_al-
Sahhaf#During...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad_Saeed_al-
Sahhaf#During_the_Iraq_war)

------
lsiebert
Congress critter is from MeFi, I Believe.

------
popee
What is her mission?

------
EvilLook
Yes, well, if it's one thing that we've learned it's that the American legal
system is wholly incapable of learning from its mistakes. It takes the action
of the legislative, executive, or higher judicial bodies to actually change
things.

~~~
visarga
Plea bargaining has been here for many years. As bad as it can get, it is the
default operating mode. Trumping up accusations in order to scare the
defendant is a negotiation tactic that comes in package with it. So what can
we do ? Is it a good idea to ban plea bargaining? I read that 90% of law suits
end in plea bargaining, so, banning this avenue would DDOS the legal system.

Justice being the best your money can buy - it's a sad reality. They can
charge an innocent and he would have to spend all he has to prove he is not
guilty. How can we stop that?

Maybe we need more lawyerless law suits, like those from Small Claims Court,
to even the playing field.

If only we could get rid of mandatory minimums and put common sense back in
the driving chair, it would be much better. Mandatory minimums are one of
those thought free zones of US, together with the war on drugs, war on terror
and "won't anyone think of the children?". I believe we need more common sense
and ethic into our justice and less automatic rubber stamping of convictions.

~~~
EvilLook
>I read that 90% of law suits end in plea bargaining

Then you don't understand what a plea bargain is. Plea bargains are used only
in criminal cases. You may have heard that 90% of lawsuits are settled before
they go to court but that has nothing to do with what a plea bargain is.

>Trumping up accusations in order to scare the defendant is a negotiation
tactic that comes in package with it.

No, trumping up accusations is grandstanding. It is neither necessary nor wise
if you have a plea bargain system in place. Yes, you can tell the defendant
what the possible maximum sentence is, but that doesn't mean you have to
grandstand and press conference the result for the rest of the world's
consumption.

>They can charge an innocent and he would have to spend all he has to prove he
is not guilty. How can we stop that?

Talk to Kevin Mitnick and Bernie S about this...

>If only we could get rid of mandatory minimums and put common sense back in
the driving chair, it would be much better.

This I agree with. The entire purpose of having a judge involved in sentencing
was to make sure that each case was judged on its own merits. Mandatory
minimums castrate the judicial system and give too much control to a
legislature that is largely bought and paid for by the
military/prison/school/election/industrial complex.

~~~
khuey
97% of federal criminal cases prosecuted to a conclusion result in plea
bargains.

[http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000087239639044358930457763...](http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390443589304577637610097206808.html)

