The Barrett Brown saga has been going on for quite a while and I haven’t discussed it here, until now. Who is Barrett Brown? Some say he “is Anonymous.”Anonymous as in these guys. His case has gotten a ton of media coverage, which you can google, or read here here here or here. Full disclosure: I know Barrett personally. It’s been years and years, but we grew up on the same street (on the same block actually). We played together as young kids. My brother babysat us together. My family has stayed in contact with his mother since the early 1980s. She’s absolutely a friend of the family.
So suffice to say I completely disagree with the government’s prosecution of Barrett. From a personal standpoint, sure. But more importantly from a legal standpoint. From a civil liberties standpoint. From a freedom standpoint. From an open society based on disseminating and discussing information standpoint.
Barrett’s been in prison a long time now for what amounts to an arrogant rant online and a bunch of nonsense. Yesterday his lawyers filed a brief asking for the charges against him to be dismissed. The US Government responded by dismissing all but 2 (most of the reports I’ve read says all but 1, but from what I can tell he’s still got a charge for possessing credit card information and one for “threatening” an FBI agent). It’s a start.
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