[innocentfelon]

Wow, EFF.

I knew when you turned me down for an amicus brief, my only hope of staying out of prison, that it was you were too busy doing more important things.

Then I see this.

Invalidating stupid patents is obviously far more important to society than writing a little note to protect the accused against rampant government misconduct and technophobia. Who needs a sixth amendment right to confrontation, anyway?

That’s definitely not what Gilmore, Barlow, and Kapor set out to do, but as I rot, at least I’ll be secure in the knowledge that patent abuse will not go unnoticed by the people I trusted in but who were too busy to help me.

[bdowling]

For the EFF, the letter and article is an easy opportunity to both (1) help out someone described as an activist and social worker and (2) take cheap jabs at the patent system. This both furthers the goal of the EFF presenting itself as a civil liberties organization, and also pleases the EFF's big anti-patent sponsors like Google. That's a win-win. It's low-hanging fruit and easy to justify having their attorney spend the afternoon on.

[jcranmer]

Having read your link... I can certainly understand why someone would be reluctant to take it on.

As far as I understand the original case, you had a business running where you'd collect used printer cartridges and refund them at retailers, pocketing the refund for yourself. The retailers had a max returns-per-person policy, which you attempted to work around by... well, the details aren't clear, which means it sounds a lot like fraud (especially in the vein of https://xkcd.com/1494/). You went to trial, where (I'm assuming) the jury felt that your scheme didn't just sound like fraud, it was fraud.

That was the clear part. At that point, it looks like you objected the amount of fraud, so you demanded that the government explain how it calculated that amount. And then it seems you didn't like the answer, so you demanded that the government turn over all pertinent financial details or something like that, and on the government's refusal to do that, you're asserting that your Sixth Amendment is being violated?

I mean, even relying solely on your own evidence trying to paint you as in good a light as possible, this just sounds like a fraudster caught in the act, trying to squirm out of any consequences whatsoever. Even if this view is completely wrong, the fact that it comes across so readily is a strong indication that it isn't the best vehicle to challenge a point of law.

[duxup]

I guess I'll ask, what is your story?

[300bps]

I went to [redacted] and spent about ten minutes reading and still had no idea what he did or what they claimed he did. I did a quick google search on his name though and found this which explained their side fairly succinctly: https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/ca10/1...

[jcranmer]

For anyone trying to figure out what's actually going on, that does appear to be the best link.

It basically boils down to: OP committed (alleged) fraud. The government used a spreadsheet populated from the defrauded's database to come to a figure for fraud, and submitted the spreadsheet as evidence. OP contends he needs access to the original database to satisfy as evidence, as a spreadsheet is potentially modifiable, but apparently doesn't allege that the data was actually modified.

Or, put another way, OP is insisting that a formatted report of SELECT * FROM table WHERE user_id=10343; should be inadmissible as evidence in court.

Money quote from the judgement: "Many of Defendants' arguments are better placed as questions concerning authentication. However, as this was not raised in the briefs, any argument to this effect was waived."

[innocentfelon]

The government did modify the spreadsheet, and we alleged as much multiple times.

They didn’t even gave us one SQL query like that. All we got was a typo-ridden excel spreadsheet, with multiple authors, no chain of custody, no queries, and a random list of accounts that can hop state lines in minutes, and they told the courts that was how the information came out of the computer.

If that SQL query was what they actually produced, everything would be fine. We asked them for the queries they used, but they refused.

The quote is what they call “dicta”, or in passing. If you follow the cited opinions in this brief you will find them all totally inappropriate. They don’t say what the circuit judge says they say. It’s like the judge just had his clerk do it and didn’t check the work.

It won’t let me respond as fast as you all are attacking me, so you’ll have to bear with me.

[innocentfelon]

Succinctly isn’t the word I would choose. A 9-page opinion with this number of issues brought is sloppy.

Check the sound bytes under exhibit B on the evidence page to hear the author of that opinion and tell me with a straight face that he got it right.

[duxup]

Yeah I had the same problem, although it's not like I'd necessarily belive the site even if I understood what it was trying to say.

[innocentfelon]

Check profile.

Happy to answer specifics.

[duxup]

Just from the outside the site seems a bit hysterical. Not something I would instinctively take seriously. You might want to add some outside, reasonable news articles or something.

[dbasedweeb]

https://casetext.com/case/united-states-v-channon-2

Basically he was nailed for wire fraud and his defense was... exotic. Upon conviction he sought a writ of certiorari so that the SCOTUS would hear his case on some pretty weird grounds.

http://mattchannon.org/petition.pdf

At a glance it seems like a situation in which someone thought they found a technicality to enact what amounted to fraud, and are pissed that the law doesn’t work like a compiler. Their response is another “I found a bug in the code” move and again, the law isn’t working like a compiler.

I don’t think making over five thousand accounts and returning tens of thousands of ink cartridges was really behavior that anyone could have thought was honest. It does seems like the government responded pretty harshly, but the system is rough. As to guilt, he would appear to be guilty, and his argument is that despite committing fraud, no one was actually hurt. That might even be true, but also not how breaking the law works.

Edit: tptacek said it better: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16926663

[innocentfelon]

Your first link, while from the case, has little to do with the appeal. To illustrate, that document (#177) happened long before the trial, and now we’re up to #485. The rest of the response makes faulty assumptions.

Amazing how “fabricated evidence” goes in one ear and out the other. “Of course you’re guilty- the fabricated evidence proves it!”

[jcranmer]

When I first clicked through to your website and read its contents, based solely on what you had written, it was hard to come away with any impression that you had committed fraud. Reading the other court documents only reinforces that impression.

In the best possible light, I would assume that you believe yourself to have found a clever hack in a returns policy [1], and that what you're doing can't be fraud since everyone involved is making money off of it. But that's not really the basis of your appeal, especially not the SCOTUS petition. Instead, the thrust is more that the spreadsheet listing the amounts of what you allegedly defrauded was fabricated. Well, actually, that's not what you're appealing directly either. The appeal actually amounts to the spreadsheet could have been fabricated, so it should be excluded as evidence. That the claim being presented here is so narrow strongly prejudices me to believe that you (or at least your attorney) is conceding that you did commit fraud, and that you've got no reasonable basis to claim that the evidence is fabricated.

[1] My personal opinion of the evidence is that you in fact knew you were committing fraud when you did it, but for the sake of argument, let's assume that you were in fact innocent.

[dbasedweeb]

It’s not that I didn’t hear you, it’s that I don’t believe you. Your own behavior and manner of presenting yourself raises manynred flags that are only confirmed by the activities you admitted to.

[duxup]

TY, creative!

[innocentfelon]

There are no outside, reasonable news sources. If you can make an intro to a journalist on my behalf, that’d help.

Otherwise, your advice is like telling a poor person they should have more money.

[duxup]

Poor person who looks poor, still looks poor even if they don't have money to buy better clothing. Not sure you need money to buy a journalist in most crime cases but ok.