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| courtesy of cryptome |
Make up your own mind. Take a moment, look at the picture above. Even if you haven't been living under a rock, you might not have yet seen it. Look at that smile. Under what conditions would you smile like that? How about while you were being raided by the Feds? Surrounded by agents of your government, acting under orders to attempt to throw the book at you?
Did you know that Aaron H. Swartz
- had been offered a plea deal of only six months incarceration -- and turned it down?
- had been investigated by the FBI and gotten his dossier and posted it online in 2009?
- wrote the supposed 'suicide note' in 2007, when he was really sick (probably food poisoning), not because he was depressed but to feel better?
- did not do anything normally thought of as hacking in order to download the JSTOR files?
- got the attention nevertheless of the Secret Service, who personally took over his case, evincing a great interest in the hardware upon which the files had been copied?
- was 'killed,' according to his father?
- was not intended to have had the book thrown at him, according to the lawyer for the prosecution?
- joins two other young internet activists fighting for free speech and privacy who have committed suicide recently?
(...and in the above I avoid the more conspiracy-minded, hypothetical, or fringe. In my opinion, or rather, my opinion of what should be the general opinion, which is to say, yours.)
All of this in the links below, and even more, as of what I avoided above I include the choicest yet encountered. All of which I also have made available for download as PDFs, links appended. In case something were to, you know, get, uh, misplaced.
Aaron Swartz was Murdered – He Faced 3 Months in Jail Not 35 Years! « American Everyman
Tom Dolan, Husband Of Aaron Swartz's Prosecutor, Defends Her On Twitter
MIT hacking case lawyer says Aaron Swartz was offered plea deal of six months behind bars - Boston.com
https://twitter.com/tomjdolan/status/291018637274390528 - Google Search
Aaron Swartz: US attorney says she only sought six-month jail term | Technology | guardian.co.uk
Reddit pioneer Aaron Swartz wrote 'suicide note' blog in 2007
Cannonfire
Carmen Ortiz’s Case Didn’t ‘Kill’ Aaron Swartz | Cognoscenti
Caught Red-Handed, Aaron Swartz Was Prepping For Key Federal Court Evidence Hearing | The Smoking Gun
MIT and Aaron Swartz — Crooked Timber
Twitter Trackbacks for @mkapor Truly incredible that in their own son's obit they blame others for his death and make no mention of the 6-month offer. [twitter.com] on Topsy.com
Twitter / ggreenwald: Carmen Ortiz's husband, IBM ...Be seeing you.
Most revealing, thanks. I reproduced it at my blog integrally, as you surely know.
ReplyDeleteyou are most welcome.
ReplyDeletei must thank you, for your keenness, for your characteristic attention to those details over which it is to the detriment of so many citizen journalists to be quick to compromise; i am honored.