The degree of militarization of, and breathtaking overreach by law enforcement depicted here is stunning. 30 camouflaged SWAT officers? To arrest a coder becaus

The degree of militarization of, and breathtaking overreach by law enforcement depicted here is stunning. 30 camouflaged SWAT officers? To arrest a coder because someone else was using his software illegally? Really? The case began in February 2011, when Stuart says he and his wife got the Kim Dotcom treatment after about 30 local Arizona law enforcement agents wearing SWAT gear and camouflage dress — some of them with bushes attached to their shoulders to blend into the woods around his house — descended on his home and threatened to send him and his wife to prison for 35 years if he didn’t cooperate. The search warrant used in the raid said Stuart and his wife were engaged in money laundering, operating an illegal enterprise and engaging in the promotion of gambling. Stuart has tried to obtain a copy of the affidavit used to get the search warrant, but it’s currently sealed. The conversation for the plea agreement occurred the day after the raid, when Stuart says he was still traumatized by the experience and had only rent-a-lawyers, hired quickly over the internet, to represent him. The lawyers urged him to cooperate and agree to the terms. And then once they arrested him, this: Stuart showed Wired a plea agreement (.pdf) signed by former Manhattan Assistant District Attorney James Meadows, which stated that he would plead guilty to second- and fourth-degree money laundering charges and assist the DA’s investigations by, among other things, “aiding in the design of software used to obtain records, usernames, passwords, and other information stored on websites using” his company’s software. Stuart says authorities specifically told him that they would not use the backdoor themselves but that he would be expected to access the servers of online casinos and others who used his software overseas in order to retrieve the information of gamblers and bookmakers on their behalf. “They made it clear that they would do nothing. I was expected to do everything, to modify the system to allow myself to get in to get the information they wanted,” he says. “Their whole intention was for me to retrieve information from those databases that were located in foreign countries…. They were going to use me to get to the clients…. But I’m not a hacker, I’m a software developer.” So in other words, these guys are too lazy to do any of the hard things associated with their job: not investigating, not establishing proof, not getting a valid search warrant that passes the laugh test. So they've decided to find ways around doing their job, and get the accused to do their job for them, via SWAT teams and threats.