The main element of the crime here was creating imaginary people to 'sign' the affidavits submitted to ARIN. Phony companies, phony people, etc.

Then the jail time is calculated based on the value of what was taken as a result of the fraud.

5 years seems fairly reasonable for a multi-million dollar scheme, involving multiple employees, explicitly designed to defraud.

White collar crime getting a lengthy custodial sentence is not the normal.

But should be ...

Do you have evidence/data to back this up?

My view on it is coloured by the way my country chases down social welfare fraud, but hardly tried with white collar crime which hits the country far harder [1].

The second link [2] is about the US.

[1] https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/300878382/newsable-bill...

[2] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47477754

I guess you missed this part:

> Prosecutors showed that each of those shell companies involved the production of notarized affidavits in the names of people who didn’t exist.

No I didn't. I'm wondering how putting someone that is arguably a smart entrepreneur behind jail for 5 year is going to better our society.

We need to think about the bigger picture and how this fits into rehabilitation.

Smart people who are willing to commit fraud for profit are some of the most dangerous people in our society. Stupid people are limited in the damage they can do.

I'm pretty sure if you have to commit wire fraud to build your business, you can't really claim to be that great an entrepreneur.

It will better our society because it will deter other smart entrepreneurs from committing this kind of blatant fraud. If anyone here is ever tempted to try to acquire an asset under false pretenses, just don't, or prison could be in your future.

Because clearly that "smart entrepreneur" has demonstrated that he has no issue willfully committing an elaborate fraud.

It's not a stretch to believe that its better for society to keep people like this (a combination of high intelligence and low morals) in a place where they can't continue to perpetrate clever schemes.

What a smart entrepreneur he was to commit fraud!

messing up and defrauding that way doesn't negate the fact that you still need to be smart on some level(depending on your definition) to create an IT company.

We should definitely punish the fraud. But also look at rehabilitation.

In this case, we are taking someone that could under the right circumstance be a net positive for society and putting him in jail for 5 years where he will most probably come out as a destroyed human.

I will never understand how people desire for revenge negate the bigger picture.

> where he will most probably come out as a destroyed human.

This is more evidence of the flaws of the (US, anyway) penal system that an argument against custodial sentences in general, no?

I get where you are coming from, but do you have practical alternatives? A slap on the wrist is probably overall a worse (global) outcome...

Retribution is an important component of an effective judicial system. It provides approximation of justice (yes) and creates deterrence. Also that was an IT company (or rather many companies) in name only. By that definition those patent troll holdings are “IT companies” too

> I will never understand how people desire for revenge negate the bigger picture.

It is more that people tend to be extremely selective about when they see that bigger picture.

There are lots of smart people rotting in prison who committed very similar crimes who never seem to elicit sympathy. Coincidentally, they tended not to be white collar strivers before being busted.

> messing up and defrauding ...

When you've created 20 shell companies, I think at this point you've gone beyond "messing up". Just like there's a difference between a crime-of-passion single murder and a serial killer.

Rehabilitation is another issue entirely. I really wish we had a system in place to make that happen, but we don't. Putting him away isn't about revenge at all, at least not to me.

He didn't 'mess up'. This wasn't an accident. Wire fraud has an intent requirement. The government has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendent acted with the intent to defraud, specifically, the 'intent to deceive and cheat'.

Not punishing this is the same as allowing it.

Because he’s a criminal cheating society out of public goods for personal gain? What has accelerationism done to your mind?

hackernews.txt

I'm all for rehabilitation, but the serious amount of criminal energy that went into this scheme would have been better spent building something useful. A thought clearly lost on this individual. Furthermore, he used his ill-gotten IP addresses to house spammers, which was actively causing harm beyond just hoarding addresses.

Robbing banks require a lot of smarts too. Say, why do we put bank robbers in jail when they could be smart entrepreneurs instead?

You are right, and should not be down-dooted.

That's in line with US sentencing guidelines[1][2][3]. Most of it came from the fact that the ip addresses were worth millions.

[1] https://www.ussc.gov/guidelines/2021-guidelines-manual/annot...

[2] https://www.ussc.gov/guidelines/2021-guidelines-manual/annot...

[3] https://www.ussc.gov/guidelines/2021-guidelines-manual/annot...

Fines don't work, they are treated like the cost of doing business, and are easy to escape (if the corporation, not the person, is fined, move as much of the money away as possible and have the corporation go bankrupt).

So execs need to consider that serious prison time is a possibility, or there will be no constraints on bad behavior.

He aimed too low.

>> "Prosecutors estimated those addresses were valued at between $10 million and $14 million."

>> "production of notarized affidavits in the names of people who didn’t exist"

> 5 years in jail seems a bit of an overreaction.

Multiple counts of fraud that would have netted $10M and did net a percentage of that? Breaking the notarization process? By a CEO of a tech company?

5 years seems about right, maybe even too lenient.

If someone walks into a bank and carries out an unlawful scheme (i.e. fake notarized paperwork) that nets millions of dollars, 5 years would be a lenient sentence.

Also, it is 3 years in jail followed by 2 years of supervised release.

For fraud?

This is evil, and I feel zero sympathy.

They should indeed make an example out of him.