Except they don't believe it was a mistake; they go as far as calling it "hacking". That the accused claims it was a mistake means little.

You can be sent to jail for a mistake if it was caused by negligence.

Well yeah obviously. The question is whether an individual should go to jail because of negligence.

Obviously, there is a real "It depends". Hit and kill an individual with your car because you were distracted? That could mean jail. Accidentally pushed code to the wrong repo? Should that mean jail time?

Well it all depends on severity of the mistake. If you run someone over with a car, even if it was an accident, ther need to be consequences.

No, it really doesn't.

If you accidentally run someone over with a car, then there was definitely a failure of something, but it wasn't a moral failing. Punishment should never be used when correcting the underlying problem will have a more lasting positive impact.

In the car example, what do you think would be better - jailing the person who drove the car, or developing systems to prevent future such accidents?