FootBallFan68
Junior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Pennsylvania
Regarding my previous post, ALL charges from PA were dropped against me for lack of jurisdiction for an out of state police officer trying to make an arrest in MD. Although being arrested and spending the weekend in jail only to have all charges dismissed by a judge with an apology still wasn't fun.
However, local police did execute a search warrant at my home regarding "fraudulent" documents I had given to a private investigator from a Law Firm representing several agencies, including the NCAA and University. They had requested FTP server logs of PDF documents downloaded from my server because they were looking for specific IP addresses from University students who were athletes that I gave to for free.
Essentially, I switched dates on the logs, made PDFs of them, and gave them to the investigator.
HOWEVER, the investigator somewhere along the way ended up giving them to the University Police, who realized they were altered. When confronted about this by the Police, I had no choice but to give them the real PDF logs, or face obstruction charges.
A search warrant was then executed, which ONLY included my two servers from which I operate my website, and they were seized. Both are fully protected with TrueCrypt bootloaders, and the full disk encryption cannot be broken, even by the FBI. The Police demanded the passwords, and I referred them to a recent Federal Court decision that says I don't have to give them any password.
I guess they sent the hard drives to a private company to attempt to break the encryption, which ultimately failed. My servers were returned to me, and I FULLY inspected them inside and out. I discovered a USB device plugged into an INTERNAL USB port that was built on a USB expansion card in residing in a PCI slot on my motherboard.
I figured it was one of those hardware keyloggers used to catch all keystrokes, so I removed it and took it back to the Police.
Essentially, I was told that I could be charged with obstruction (even though there was no WARRANT for its installation) UNLESS I gave up my passwords and repaid the 16,500$ (as a civil fine) spent to the private company for trying to break the encryption of the disks.
MY question is can they actually do that, or are they attempting to trick me because they know they have been caught and can really do nothing? I DID have a lawyer for the original charges, but his retainer was all used up and I am tight for cash this month because of the down time with my business servers, so any advice is appreciated.
Oh and to the previous poster on the other thread - regarding the legality of my business - my business plan was approved by legal counsel when I started it 2 years ago. The judge that dismissed the charges against me even said that while not "high-minded or moral" he saw no reason why the University or State could file charges against me. He just warned me in 10 years when a Doctor or Engineer who used my site royally messes up, be prepared to be in a lawsuit.
Regarding my previous post, ALL charges from PA were dropped against me for lack of jurisdiction for an out of state police officer trying to make an arrest in MD. Although being arrested and spending the weekend in jail only to have all charges dismissed by a judge with an apology still wasn't fun.
However, local police did execute a search warrant at my home regarding "fraudulent" documents I had given to a private investigator from a Law Firm representing several agencies, including the NCAA and University. They had requested FTP server logs of PDF documents downloaded from my server because they were looking for specific IP addresses from University students who were athletes that I gave to for free.
Essentially, I switched dates on the logs, made PDFs of them, and gave them to the investigator.
HOWEVER, the investigator somewhere along the way ended up giving them to the University Police, who realized they were altered. When confronted about this by the Police, I had no choice but to give them the real PDF logs, or face obstruction charges.
A search warrant was then executed, which ONLY included my two servers from which I operate my website, and they were seized. Both are fully protected with TrueCrypt bootloaders, and the full disk encryption cannot be broken, even by the FBI. The Police demanded the passwords, and I referred them to a recent Federal Court decision that says I don't have to give them any password.
I guess they sent the hard drives to a private company to attempt to break the encryption, which ultimately failed. My servers were returned to me, and I FULLY inspected them inside and out. I discovered a USB device plugged into an INTERNAL USB port that was built on a USB expansion card in residing in a PCI slot on my motherboard.
I figured it was one of those hardware keyloggers used to catch all keystrokes, so I removed it and took it back to the Police.
Essentially, I was told that I could be charged with obstruction (even though there was no WARRANT for its installation) UNLESS I gave up my passwords and repaid the 16,500$ (as a civil fine) spent to the private company for trying to break the encryption of the disks.
MY question is can they actually do that, or are they attempting to trick me because they know they have been caught and can really do nothing? I DID have a lawyer for the original charges, but his retainer was all used up and I am tight for cash this month because of the down time with my business servers, so any advice is appreciated.
Oh and to the previous poster on the other thread - regarding the legality of my business - my business plan was approved by legal counsel when I started it 2 years ago. The judge that dismissed the charges against me even said that while not "high-minded or moral" he saw no reason why the University or State could file charges against me. He just warned me in 10 years when a Doctor or Engineer who used my site royally messes up, be prepared to be in a lawsuit.
Last edited:
