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FBI director Comey said: "Although we did not find clear evidence that Sec. Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws governing the handling of classif

FBI director Comey said: "Although we did not find clear evidence that Sec. Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws governing the handling of classified information, there is evidence that they were extremely careless." What I find interesting about that is that the law states that intent to violate the law is not required, gross negligence is sufficient. Here the FBI director states himself that Sec. Clinton was extremely careless yet he doesn't recommend prosecution. The law (section f): https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/793 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/793

daveguy 10y ago
Not a lawyer, but I think "extreme carelessness" is a step below "gross negligence". I think gross negligence has specific meaning. Any lawyers in the house familiar with this kind of law?
- DominikR 10y ago
  Where ever I looked it up carelessness is almost always the first that comes up in online law dictionaries to describe gross negligence. But I'm not a lawyer too. http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/gross+negligence http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/gross+negligen...
FungalRaincloud 10y ago
So, I agree with you. She violated the letter of the law. The argument that the FBI director is making is that the law, while saying that negligence is also a violation, has never been tested with regard to negligence. It has only been used to convict people who intentionally released secrets. The FBI director is right that it is novel application of the law, but that does not mean we don't attempt to apply it. That's my problem, is that the spirit of the law is clear in this case, but he's saying we shouldn't attempt to prosecute because it would be a novel application, regardless of the spirit. In the end, we will have to hold our breath and wait for the AG to make a decision. I believe if I were in her shoes, I'd be praying that I received a minor fine for contempt of court, because of the statement that was made that the server was in use to make it possible to use only one phone. She obviously lied, there, because they found that multiple devices had been used. Her campaign would benefit from her admitting that she misspoke, and facing a slap on the wrist, because many will see it as her having done nothing wrong but lying. If she doesn't even get the slap on the wrist, she could be torn apart by a willing opponent (or motivated super PAC). That's just my feeling on it, though. It remains to be seen if she will even get a slap on the wrist and it remains to be seen whether the American people even care about the scandal.
daughart 10y ago
Gross negligence and extreme carelessness are not the same. Gross negligence is a conscious and voluntary disregard of the need to use reasonable care. Clinton clearly understood the need for reasonable care as she took some security measures and asked people not to email her confidential materials. She merely did a poor job executing on the knowledge that care was needed, which in this case is not actually illegal (especially when grave harms did not occur, which is an additional legal factor). The laws are written around consent because the goal of the law is to enable punishment of people who intend to harm the US government. Note that Comey said that it's the individual's responsibility to know when material is confidential, even if that is not marked. Yet even information that is widely reported on in the media can still be considered confidential. The law is written to protect those who take "careless" or "negligent" actions in light of the difficulty of the task of maintaining confidentiality during the kind of extensive communications required to execute the business of government.
- DominikR 10y ago
  I'm not convinced by this, especially when I see emails from Sec. Clinton like these: https://sli.mg/gHT80S https://sli.mg/gHT80S Someone had issues sending her a secure fax and she replied that he should send it nonpaper and unsecure and to make it even worse - remove the identifying header (classified, secret, top secret and so on) This is intent in my view. Not to harm the US, but to ignore the law because it's more convenient to her.
  - daughart 10y ago
    That's not clear at all -- there's no evidence that information was classified in the first place, but moreover a request to convert to "nonpaper" refers to sending a written summary or briefing. Jake Sullivan is no fool, he's a law professor at Yale. It is equally reasonable to assume that the request to send nonsecure includes an implicit request to not include confidential materials in the "nonpaper" version. Rational and intelligent actors could be assumed to act in a legal way based on this legal request.
brainfire 10y ago
Gross negligence AND the actual loss/spillage of the information would, together, be sufficient under section f. Is there evidence of the latter?

daveguy 10y ago

Not a lawyer, but I think "extreme carelessness" is a step below "gross negligence". I think gross negligence has specific meaning. Any lawyers in the house familiar with this kind of law?

DominikR 10y ago
Where ever I looked it up carelessness is almost always the first that comes up in online law dictionaries to describe gross negligence. But I'm not a lawyer too. http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/gross+negligence http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/gross+negligen...

FungalRaincloud 10y ago

So, I agree with you. She violated the letter of the law. The argument that the FBI director is making is that the law, while saying that negligence is also a violation, has never been tested with regard to negligence. It has only been used to convict people who intentionally released secrets. The FBI director is right that it is novel application of the law, but that does not mean we don't attempt to apply it. That's my problem, is that the spirit of the law is clear in this case, but he's saying we shouldn't attempt to prosecute because it would be a novel application, regardless of the spirit. In the end, we will have to hold our breath and wait for the AG to make a decision. I believe if I were in her shoes, I'd be praying that I received a minor fine for contempt of court, because of the statement that was made that the server was in use to make it possible to use only one phone. She obviously lied, there, because they found that multiple devices had been used. Her campaign would benefit from her admitting that she misspoke, and facing a slap on the wrist, because many will see it as her having done nothing wrong but lying. If she doesn't even get the slap on the wrist, she could be torn apart by a willing opponent (or motivated super PAC). That's just my feeling on it, though. It remains to be seen if she will even get a slap on the wrist and it remains to be seen whether the American people even care about the scandal.

daughart 10y ago

Gross negligence and extreme carelessness are not the same. Gross negligence is a conscious and voluntary disregard of the need to use reasonable care. Clinton clearly understood the need for reasonable care as she took some security measures and asked people not to email her confidential materials. She merely did a poor job executing on the knowledge that care was needed, which in this case is not actually illegal (especially when grave harms did not occur, which is an additional legal factor). The laws are written around consent because the goal of the law is to enable punishment of people who intend to harm the US government. Note that Comey said that it's the individual's responsibility to know when material is confidential, even if that is not marked. Yet even information that is widely reported on in the media can still be considered confidential. The law is written to protect those who take "careless" or "negligent" actions in light of the difficulty of the task of maintaining confidentiality during the kind of extensive communications required to execute the business of government.

DominikR 10y ago
I'm not convinced by this, especially when I see emails from Sec. Clinton like these: https://sli.mg/gHT80S https://sli.mg/gHT80S Someone had issues sending her a secure fax and she replied that he should send it nonpaper and unsecure and to make it even worse - remove the identifying header (classified, secret, top secret and so on) This is intent in my view. Not to harm the US, but to ignore the law because it's more convenient to her.
- daughart 10y ago
  That's not clear at all -- there's no evidence that information was classified in the first place, but moreover a request to convert to "nonpaper" refers to sending a written summary or briefing. Jake Sullivan is no fool, he's a law professor at Yale. It is equally reasonable to assume that the request to send nonsecure includes an implicit request to not include confidential materials in the "nonpaper" version. Rational and intelligent actors could be assumed to act in a legal way based on this legal request.

brainfire 10y ago

Gross negligence AND the actual loss/spillage of the information would, together, be sufficient under section f. Is there evidence of the latter?