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Again, completely agree with you that the situation you're describing should be rendered inadmissible as evidence given the severe duress you must have been und

Again, completely agree with you that the situation you're describing should be rendered inadmissible as evidence given the severe duress you must have been under. In regards to the printer cartridges (thread 34241769), I'd agree that objectively speaking you didn't really steal anything. You found an arbitrage opportunity and used it to the mutual benefit of yourself and the corporation buying the cartridges for $3 each to refill/resell. In the case of the business rewards, that corporation created a customer rewards system, and you found an exploit in the system (i.e. using the store/receipt number along with a programmatic search for past transactions). I think if you had used this exploit casually, the FBI would not even bother pursuing it, and it probably wouldn't have been detected in the first place. There is some level of acceptance you need to have in the fact that you broke the terms of service by creating thousands of fake accounts, went to many stores in many different cities/states, adapted the exploit (when they added purchase amount verification) by noting purchase amounts of other customers in the store, resold the benefits on eBay, hired an accomplice in New Mexico, and so on. On a personal level though, I'm sincerely rooting for you - the amounts in question are a rounding error to that size of corporation, and the "stolen funds" in question were anyways intended for customer rewards. I think your best outcome from a legal perspective is to admit what the evidence overwhelmingly seems to indicate, be radically honest with yourself about the situation, and resist the urge to be combative on technicalities - consider how it may lead to a worse overall outcome.

mchannon 4y ago
I encourage you to watch or re-watch the stoning scene in Life of Brian. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDe9msExUK8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDe9msExUK8 @ 2:50). "You're just making it worse for yourself!" "Worse? How could it be worse?" Terms of service are an interesting thing: 1. They have no force of law behind them. 2. They aren't written by congress and should not be treated as such. 3. A corporation writes them for their own benefit. 4. A corporation changes them for their own benefit. 5. A corporation follows them, or doesn't, for their own benefit. Any violation of corporate terms of service is, at best, a civil tort, not a criminal offense against these United States. Unless you're me, I suppose. Further, these aren't terms of service I clicked "Agree" to, and in fact they evolved several times without my having read them, nor needed to have read them. In retrospect, a steady series of frog boiling changes turned my conduct from allowed to questionable. I say questionable instead of illegal, or even forbidden, because I also had, upon every adjustment, explicit written permission from the company to adjust transactions I had not made. Maybe they didn't intend that with their word choices (they reworded it once without changing the meaning), but that just makes it sharp dealing, not fraud. That was absolutely sharp dealing (not a single other customer lost out on rewards, because of how their system was set up). Sharp dealing also happens to take place when an average consumer signs up for a rewards program, or a protection plan, or this week's sale when the actual price on a sale item is actually higher than last week's. I sharp dealt a sharp dealer. That much is true. The accounts were actual accounts, predicated on fake information (this is not a minor distinction). The fake information was never read by any human, and fake not as a vehicle to defraud (since no human read them), but to avoid getting confused with other customers (it had been a problem), and to avoid getting junk mail. Is the person in line ahead of you at Kroger or Albertson's a fraudster for doing the same? Even if they have 5,000 rewards accounts? Assuming the worst motives in people might be the most comforting way to be, but it's not always the correct way to be. Appreciate the legal advice (though I don't advise giving people legal advice), but I'd appreciate your considering how many people advise me to do what is easy (they think) instead of what is right. Ever considered signing something you knew wasn't true? That's what the plea offers were, not true. I had 20+ years staring at me on the other side of this false paper I was asked to sign and I don't think I could've signed it if my life depended on it. There's something deeper and more visceral to a signature than an idle scrawl. It's a door to your soul. Does that make me a more moral person than average? Perhaps not, but better than the treatment I've been getting.

mchannon 4y ago

I encourage you to watch or re-watch the stoning scene in Life of Brian. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDe9msExUK8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDe9msExUK8 @ 2:50). "You're just making it worse for yourself!" "Worse? How could it be worse?" Terms of service are an interesting thing: 1. They have no force of law behind them. 2. They aren't written by congress and should not be treated as such. 3. A corporation writes them for their own benefit. 4. A corporation changes them for their own benefit. 5. A corporation follows them, or doesn't, for their own benefit. Any violation of corporate terms of service is, at best, a civil tort, not a criminal offense against these United States. Unless you're me, I suppose. Further, these aren't terms of service I clicked "Agree" to, and in fact they evolved several times without my having read them, nor needed to have read them. In retrospect, a steady series of frog boiling changes turned my conduct from allowed to questionable. I say questionable instead of illegal, or even forbidden, because I also had, upon every adjustment, explicit written permission from the company to adjust transactions I had not made. Maybe they didn't intend that with their word choices (they reworded it once without changing the meaning), but that just makes it sharp dealing, not fraud. That was absolutely sharp dealing (not a single other customer lost out on rewards, because of how their system was set up). Sharp dealing also happens to take place when an average consumer signs up for a rewards program, or a protection plan, or this week's sale when the actual price on a sale item is actually higher than last week's. I sharp dealt a sharp dealer. That much is true. The accounts were actual accounts, predicated on fake information (this is not a minor distinction). The fake information was never read by any human, and fake not as a vehicle to defraud (since no human read them), but to avoid getting confused with other customers (it had been a problem), and to avoid getting junk mail. Is the person in line ahead of you at Kroger or Albertson's a fraudster for doing the same? Even if they have 5,000 rewards accounts? Assuming the worst motives in people might be the most comforting way to be, but it's not always the correct way to be. Appreciate the legal advice (though I don't advise giving people legal advice), but I'd appreciate your considering how many people advise me to do what is easy (they think) instead of what is right. Ever considered signing something you knew wasn't true? That's what the plea offers were, not true. I had 20+ years staring at me on the other side of this false paper I was asked to sign and I don't think I could've signed it if my life depended on it. There's something deeper and more visceral to a signature than an idle scrawl. It's a door to your soul. Does that make me a more moral person than average? Perhaps not, but better than the treatment I've been getting.