>The prosecutor in the case, Assistant District Attorney Steve Fein, described the plea deal to The Daily Beast as a fair outcome, noting that accessory after the fact is also a felony, though not a violent one that would place Gattani at risk of being deported back to his native India.
>Fein noted that the plea calls for a six-month jail term, though only 30 days of actual incarceration, with the balance served in the weekend-work program, doing manual labor for eight-hour shifts but otherwise at liberty. Fein maintained that Rastogi offered no objection when he provided her with the details of the deal.
Some other lovely things this guy said:
>“Yeah I would like to see you murdered,” he says. “I used to always think, like in some murders (in movies and all) they show that the murderer stabbed the victim with a knife 45 times; how would someone do that. Killing someone even once is so difficult to accomplish. Then how can that person/man stab the knife in the victim’s body so many times. I now imagine and can relate now to doing that to you. And I am not kidding. If you can’t believe me I can swear on anyone’s life.”
This doesn't seem like justice given this is his second incident. I am all for second chances, but beating your wife probably multiple times should be grounds for having the book thrown at you including getting kicked out of the country. How he is getting 30 days for all the things he put this women though. They need to throw him jail for a while.
Many years ago my colleagues and I helped another colleague and her kids move out of her home. She was deathly scared of her abuser husband and planned everything in secret. But things quite stressful when the husband showed up in the middle of the move (a neighbor called the husband thinking a burglary was taking place). In the end nobody got hurt and we drove away the moving van but we were all shaking. Her husband was a NASA scientist.
The point I want to make is abusers come from all walks of life and are of every nationality. Please do not use this incident as an excuse to generalize or discriminate against Indians or any other particular group. Abusers need to be punished to the full extent of the law, regardless their origin. In this particular case you can look up on crunchbase who funded this guy's company and try to bear pressure.
Strangely, it appears the main reason this was not elevated to felony assault is because the DA in St Clara County avoided that because it could lead to deportation which the DA prefers to avoid, "Fein indicated that his boss, Santa Clara District Attorney Jeff Rosen, seeks to avoid such deportations".
That seems odd. Not saying Rosen's decision is as malformed as Aaron Pesky's, but it deserves some questioning.
As policy, I don't think anything like immigration status should be a consideration when deciding on charges. There's a reason our ideal of justice is depicted as blind. Perhaps it could be considered as mitigating/aggravating circumstance at sentencing.
Judges don't get fired. And that's a good thing, generally speaking because they are not subject to vagaries of the day or politics. That said, very poor judges can get reprimands, recalls or impeachments.
I uprooted this not because I think any of us should take purist interest in the tragic events of someone else's life. The article is interesting on many levels.
This how an abuser works, subtly and forcefully both. The dialogue is also bizarre in that it focuses on technical details as a vehicle (and would be almost incomprehensible 10 years ago.
It shows how the justice system works at the retail ("end user") level, when most discussion of justice issues happens at a macro level.
And it shows how ubiquitous cameras/recording devices change not just police and politicians, not just big airlines, but the justice in proples' lives. Ubiquitous surveillance cuts both ways.
(Plus there's the weirdness of the court being in "fabled Palo Alto" -- wtf?)
The stereotypical wife beater is an unemployed alcoholic white man who wears a ketchup-stained wifebeater (hence the nickname) and lives a trailer park. They're not loaded senior execs/CEOs running large companies in Palo Alto, which is one of the richest cities in the entire US.
And of course, if someone conforming to the stereotype were to find themselves in court facing identical charges, they would not be walking away with a slap on the wrist...
I found this video very interesting. I always hear about the sexist tech culture, but I've never been a witness to it. Seeing this video helps me get a more complete picture. I can now see how an asshole like this would take his attitude to work and treat female employees in a similar manner.
Obviously this is not unique to tech, but hearing a guy beat his wife over a "bug", something I deal with and talk to people about at work daily, is really disturbing in a unique way.
Why hasn't this gotten more press? I realize it's a new story but when you Google his name the first thing that comes up is his disgusting LinkedIn page. Hoping this seriously disrupts his life. Because that would serve him right. What a sociopath.
Okay, I admit I found it hard to read the beating transcript in detail so I just skimmed. Could someone tell/confirm for me: is he actually beating her because of a software/design problem?
I have no idea what the Santa Clara judge was thinking, but I think he just made a whole lot of women feel like taking such things to court will actually make things work. I'm pretty sure Neha will get beaten up even more after Guttani leaves in 13 days.
Why would he even care if he gets deported. Does America really want scum like this? Silicon Valley investors will invest in his company anyway, just the way United stock has sprung back.
This makes me incredibly sad how such actions go away unpunished without any serious repercussions.
even the trivial jail time of 30 days is not what he'll actually serve--that's apparently only 13 days.
towards the end of the article:
"The parties had apparently decided to knock the two days off what was effectively a 15-day jail sentence, making it 13 for Gattani. And Gattani would be allowed to serve the weekends first, in accordance with his preference."
(the "two days" refers to portions of two consecutive days Gattani spent in jail immediately after his arrest.)
the sentence is of course based on the crime he was charged with--but he crime he was charged with was not "felony assault", instead it was watered down to avoid any chance that he'll be deported.
But to 36-year-old Rastogi’s dismay, the top charge against Abhishek was reduced from felony assault to felony accessory after the fact, with an accompanying misdemeanor of “offensive touching.”
so those nine or so loud whacks heard in the audio recording--the sound of Gattani hitting his wife on the side of the head with a closed fist--were just "offensive touching"
and the "accessory after the fact" is just bizarre. Gattani wasn't an accessory to the assault, he was the assailant--the only one!
The particular type of accessory--"after the fact"--refers to someone who did not even participate in the primary offense, but was only involved after it was committed (eg, usually invoked when someone conceals or destroys evidence of the crime).
and even to that Alice-in-Wonderland charge, Gattani only had to plead "no contest"; apparently he wasn't required to plead "guilty" to get the benefit of the plea bargain.
Though I don't claim this particular case is usual, it is sadly true that wife abuse is far more common in Indian culture than in the US.
In a conversation recently between my wife and an Indian neighbor, it was mentioned in passing that a spouse would be jailed for physical abuse. The married Indian women looked rather worried and asked if it happened just once and that was it then surely no one would get in trouble?
It's dangerous to justify a statement about a large group of people or their culture using anecdotes. It's the kind of reasoning that leads to racism, antisemitism, etc.
Men in India are far different than Indian men in America though. Indian men in America have the lowest crime rates by an order of magnitude in all facets, are the wealthiest, possess the highest percentage of college degrees etc. You're seeing the best and the brightest with a few scum that slip through the cracks. There are tens of millions of people in India especially in villages that force marry children and do a whole bunch of stupid shit. This is a completely different subset. If this study was done for Indian men in America I am confident that it would be as low or lower than any other ethnic group
Unfortunately, even the pop culture e.g. movies, also showed the hero slapping the heroine, when she does some mistake like plotting against the family. And these kind of movies were made well upto late 90s.
In the movie, the male-hero always does it for a justifiable cause. But how does, the real life male, distinguish, between situations.
This case (OP article) is of a psychopath like person. But in general there are lot of misdemeanors (thankfully, much lighter compared to this). The first step for fixing that, is acknowledging that problem exists.
>>
Multiple times in the past, Mr Gattani would come back home from Cuberon, his startup, after having an argument with his co-founder and tell me, “you and my co-founder (who shall remain unnamed) are the same – lazy, empty promise makers, Positive fools, with no results. I can’t trust him.”
>>
This is shameful and sadly just another example of one of the reasons why so many woman do not come forward.
Also extremely upsetting to see next to nothing about it on twitter. We badger United (rightfully so), but us living and working here in the Bay Area barely seem to even notice things like this. It's our voice that can have the most impact here in at the very least making it difficult for him to keep his job. Without severe consequences people, especially those in power, will continue to abuse.
There seem to me several perpetrators in this case, with Gattani being the primary one. DA Jeff Rosen and Assistant DA Steve Fein, along with Judge Danner are all perpetrators, by ridiculing the victim, and aiding Gattani to stay in the country and further torture and victimize the victim further. The people of Santa Clara county will remember DA Jeff Rosen when it is election time. SHAME on you Rosen.
He was given a lesser than normal charge because to quote:
'He confirmed that Gattani’s immigration status was a factor.
“It was a consideration, yes,” he said.'...
"Santa Clara District Attorney Jeff Rosen, seeks to avoid such deportations."
No, if the alleged crimes are legitimate, he needs to be jailed. Simply handing him off to continue his abuse in another country doesn't fix the problem. It's not like the US has any hesitation with imprisoning people for petty crimes, they sure as hell could do well to actually put away criminals. If he gets deported after serving a sentence, by all means, but we should be focused on actually solving problem behavior not just simply passing the buck.
He's a criminal, and criminals should go to jail. Only after release they should be deported.
Cost is not the issue. The issue is letting criminals go unpunished, because their only sentence is getting a free ride back to their country (which, btw, is also paid by taxpayers dollars).
>>He's a criminal, and criminals should go to jail. Only after release they should be deported.
That's not how it works. We deport illegal aliens instead of putting them in prison, despite the fact that they broke the law. The reason is obvious.
>>The issue is letting criminals go unpunished, because their only sentence is getting a free ride back to their country (which, btw, is also paid by taxpayers dollars).
The cost of the plane ticket simply pales in comparison to housing and feeding him over the course of many years.
Besides, the US has treaties with most countries whereby deported criminals serve prison sentences in their home countries. I can assure you prisons in India are not very comfortable...
I'm disturbed seeing this article as well, but if the tech industry is going to face the facts, this needs to be upvoted.
Gamergate?
Uber's woes?
It's indicative of a larger problem.
I would prefer less commentary and more call to action in the discussion, but that's just me. This is happening right in Santa Clara! Call the "Santa Clara Hall of Justice!" This is local government, tell them how you feel.
So a discussion of a larger problem in tech would seem very warranted on HN, but this article is very specific in its scope and it comes out in the discussion that formed around it. I.e. lots of, "this individual is disgusting" vs "this ties into the larger problem in tech." Again, I completely agree with the sentiments expressed - but HN is an explicitly walled garden.
>Fein noted that the plea calls for a six-month jail term, though only 30 days of actual incarceration, with the balance served in the weekend-work program, doing manual labor for eight-hour shifts but otherwise at liberty. Fein maintained that Rastogi offered no objection when he provided her with the details of the deal.
Some other lovely things this guy said: >“Yeah I would like to see you murdered,” he says. “I used to always think, like in some murders (in movies and all) they show that the murderer stabbed the victim with a knife 45 times; how would someone do that. Killing someone even once is so difficult to accomplish. Then how can that person/man stab the knife in the victim’s body so many times. I now imagine and can relate now to doing that to you. And I am not kidding. If you can’t believe me I can swear on anyone’s life.”
This doesn't seem like justice given this is his second incident. I am all for second chances, but beating your wife probably multiple times should be grounds for having the book thrown at you including getting kicked out of the country. How he is getting 30 days for all the things he put this women though. They need to throw him jail for a while.