http://www.nwfusion.com/news/2001/0419sabotage.html Computer sabotage case back in court Network World, 04/19/01 PHILADELPHIA - The government battled against defense arguments here Thursday to reinstate a guilty verdict in a case that was the first criminal prosecution of computer sabotage. The government contends that a District Court judge overstepped legal protocol and "abused his discretion" when interviewing a juror who came forward with a concern after the verdict had been rendered. Based on that, the government maintains the judge incorrectly set aside the jury's guilty verdict and sent the case back to be retried. The defense, however, argued in front of the three-person appellate panel that the juror had received information outside of the courtroom that could have inappropriately swayed her decision, so the judge was correct in setting aside the verdict. Tim Lloyd of Wilmington, Del., was found guilty last spring of planting a software time bomb http://www.nwfusion.com/news/2000/0515convict.html in a centralized file server at Omega Engineering's Bridgeport, N.J., manufacturing plant. The malicious software code destroyed the programs that ran the company's manufacturing machines, costing Omega more than $10 million in losses, $2 million in reprogramming costs, and eventually leading to 80 layoffs. But the case was derailed last summer, just a few months after the jury rendered a guilty verdict in a U.S. District Court in Newark, N.J. The Hon. William Walls, who presided over the four-week trial, set aside the decision after a juror who heard the case approached the court with concerns days after the guilty verdict had been handed in http://www.nwfusion.com/news/2000/0717verdict.html. The juror at issue told the judge she was unsure whether a television news story about the Love Bug computer virus had factored into her verdict, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Grady O'Malley, who prosecuted the case. "Although she couldn't articulate what impact it had, she simply made the statement that she was unsure about whether it was important to bring to the court's attention," O'Malley says. . . . . _______________________ Marjorie Simmons, Esq. lawyerat_private http://www.carpereslegalis.com ISN is hosted by SecurityFocus.com --- To unsubscribe email LISTSERVat_private with a message body of "SIGNOFF ISN".
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