Palin set to take stand in Tennessee hacking trial

[d_r]

Source: Chattanooga Times Free Press

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — A former college student charged with hacking Sarah Palin's e-mail account fears some jurors in heavily Republican East Tennessee could be dazzled when the conservative star testifies.

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He was a University of Tennessee student majoring in economics when prosecutors say he hacked into the Yahoo! account Palin sometimes used for state business. At the time she was Alaska's governor and the GOP candidate for vice president.

U.S. District Judge Thomas Phillips has denied a defense motion to have prospective jurors answer a questionnaire asking if they have strong political feelings about Palin. Kernell's attorney, Wade Davies, cited Palin's speaking slot at a tea party movement convention and frequent television appearances. She is hugely popular with conservatives.

Convictions on all four felony charges — identity theft, wire fraud, intentionally accessing Palin's e-mail account without authorization and obstructing an FBI investigation — could send Kernell to prison for up to 50 years.

Read more: http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/2010/apr/20/palin-set-take-stand-tennessee-hacking-trial/

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I'm afraid this kid may be screwed - I want to think that if she was using that yahoo email account for public business that it should be legal to out it out in the open, but I am afraid the law and the jury aren't going to agree with me.

[no limit]

1. You cant even consider what he did hacking. This is nuts

[happygoluckytoyou]

12. INQUIRING MINDS ASK---Won't her flesh fry and blister when she puts her hand on the bible?

[happygoluckytoyou]

13. IN A RELATED STORY - Will Sarah only be allowed to speak in Palindrones

[Buenaventura]

17. true - guessing a four letter password

is hardly hacking.

[anigbrowl]

28. Doesn't matter. The law doesn't require cleverness...

...only unauthorized access.

[Cirque du So-What]

2. I hope his attorney is up to the task of mounting an effective defense

against these trumped-up charges. What should also be at issue here is why did Iquitarod maintain a private account on which her state's business was being conducted?

[dixiegrrrrl]

3. Maybe if they don't give her a private jet, she won't show?

[Javaman]

4. Shade of things to come...

this is a perfect example of how our justice system will work if the ball licking tea baggers get into power.

[Turbineguy]

5. Being something of a hack herself...

[nc4bo]

6. Hey, was there ever a full release of any of those emails?

The Yahoo and/or State of Alaska account.

Bet there's lots of gems located within.

[Downwinder]

7. How come if the r'pubs do something it is just a youthful prank?

[onehandle]

8. Millionaire Sister Sarah plays victim. nt

[jberryhill]

9. "it should be legal to out it out in the open"

There are two separate issues.

First, yes, if she was conducting state business using the Yahoo account, then it should be public record.

However, if you want access to a public record, then you file a FOIA request (or the Alaska state equivalent) and sue for what you do not get. You don't then engage in unauthorized access of a computer system to get it.

If my accountant is embezzling money, I don't rob the bank where he keeps it.

[happygoluckytoyou]

26. HER HAND isn't big enough to crayon all the notes she's gonna need for this one!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[robinblue]

10. Hacking is wrong-for both sides. I do

hope he gets a fair trial.

[h9socialist]

11. Telling "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth" . . .

. . . will be a new experience for Caribou Barbie! I doubt she can handle it.

[Raschel]

14. She'll love this. Sarah divisive and hateful.

[demi moore]

15. yes.. O'Keefe comes to mind

he should go for the defence that he just wanted to know why she was not awnsering his e-mails. and instead of calling him a hacker.. call him a journalist.
that will make those robotlicans compute the fox propagana program installed onto them.

then all he needs to do is to make them think he is one of them... like on zombie movies how the zombies never eat each other... but for gods sake don't let them smell the commie on him.. or they will have a feast

[tomm2thumbs]

16. all this hacking - they should just hand out some cough drops already

i'm sorry, that was beyond terrible

[Doctor_J]

18. She ran state business on Yahoo?

She should be in prison for that.

[anigbrowl]

29. A fringe benefit of the trial might be her having to admit that in public... nt

[bergie321]

19. She is gonna be pissed

When she finds out she isn't getting paid for this appearance.

Too bad the kid didn't dress up like a pimp while hacking her email.

He should get the same deal that was given to the Faux News operatives who broke into Mary Landrieu's office to bug her phone.

[Bitwit1234]

20. How can they stand to listen to her voice anyway.

She sounds like a rhino bel lowering in heat.

[azuka]

21. Hacking

I don't remember any more the ins and outs of this issue, what information was gained and what exactly was done with it.

Regardless how easy or hard it is to guess someone's password is irrelevant. It's not the level of skill involved in hacking, but rather that it was obvious that the owner of the email address desired to restrict access to her account. So, in my mind, he has no defense against hacking as far as that goes.

Further, what info did he collect and what did he do with it? If it was related to political issues and thoughts, should he have the right to that info and to broadcast it? I'm not sure. If it was personal stuff, like family info and so on, then it should be totally illegal and he should be prosecuted.

If it's legal to hack your way into an email address and divulge the information from one politician or public figure, then it should be legal to hack your way into ANYBODY'S email address. Whatever happened to some semblance of privacy?

If this email address was provided by the state of Alaska government, then I don't think she has any reason to expect privacy..... within the Alaskan government. Someone from Tennessee has no business hacking into a government or corporate email system. If the email address was like from Yahoo or Hotmail, then this guy really has no defense.


How about the guy who hacked into the Global Warming Research computers and downloaded tons of emails? I'm of the opinion that he shouldn't have hacked into it. On the other hand, it looks like he uncovered a massive attempt to hide information damaging to the man-made Global Warming theory. I think this is information that should be public and freely available. I think it was good that this came to light, but I don't agree with the methods used.

In my life, my son has been going through a divorce for the last year. His ex found a way to acquire his email password, and no, it wasn't anything obvious or easy. I think she hired an illegal offshore hacking site to get the password. She scrutinized the emails coming in and out of his account to look for damaging info. She forwarded emails that she thought she could do something with to her own email address and later to her attorney so he could print them out. These emails were presented in a court proceeding as support for a contention of hers that he was hiding massive amounts of income (from an Ebay enterprise between my son and myself).

She attempted to use the threat of disclosing/using this info to persuade my son to give up his attempts to have child custody and to allow her to remove his son to Texas, over 1200 miles away. My son didn't buckle, the judge dismissed the illegally obtained info, and my son and I filed felony charges against her for this hacking.

The sheriff's office decided against pursuing the felony charge because no real damage was done, and also because of 'hard feelings' between husband and wife. Mostly I think they just didn't want to get involved. We checked out the state law, and there is no doubt that she committed a felonious action.

For me, having someone hack into my personal emails is not a hypothetical issue. It happened to me. I didn't like it. I don't think someone should be able to hack into ANYBODY'S email account without severe consequences. Have you ever sent emails to others that you would prefer were not made public? I sure have. I think politicians should be able to have some privacy in their lives.

This guy knew what he was doing, knew it was risky, and did it anyway. So it goes.

[bc3000]

22. Some people need to ask themselves how they'd feel about this from the other side

If this was a conservative that hacked into a democrat's email, I think a lot of people here would be pretty angry about it.

[bergie321]

23. If it was a Conservative

The charges would have been quietly reduced to misdemeanors and be swept under the rug as "youthful indiscretions"

[MilesColtrane]

24. This guy is fucked.

50 years in ClubFed seems rather harsh for what he's accused of doing.

But, combine a star-struck jury and a judge that doesn't seem to be disposed to mitigate a long sentence, and the defendant could be going away for essentially life.

[fishwax]

25. 50 years is too harsh, but what he's accused of is clearly against the law

It isn't (and shouldn't be) legal to break into someone's email and post the contents publicly. Even if some of the email are legally subject to public scrutiny, there are appropriate ways to go about it.

[Yavin4]

27. My Heart Goes Out To The Court Reporter

Who will have to transcribe Palin's gibberish.