By popular demand, here is yesterday's installment in the US v. Johnson cypherpunk trial. It is expected to end today, according to email last night from CJ's attorney, Gene Grantham: >We expect the trial to conclude tomorrow and a ruling by Judge Bryan is >expected tomorrow, as well. Judge Bryan is an excellent judge, but I can't >even begin to predict what his ruling will be. Blanc was called to testify because her name was mentioned in a email message posted to cypherpunks (allegedly by CJ) that ranted about Bill Gates and Microsoft products. The IRS and DoJ argue it was a threat. Details at (http://jya.com/cejfiles.htm) Also John Gilmore has found a list of CJ's country music albums: http://jya.com/cej-music.htm -Declan ******* From: "Blanc" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 22:44:44 -0700 I appeared today in Tacoma, for all of about 10 minutes, at Gene Grantham's request. I did have to wait around about 1 hour because the other questioning was taking longer than expected. I walked up to the doors once and peeked in, and could slightly hear Jeff Gordon under questioning, saying inaudible things about "cypherpunks" this and "cypherpunk" that. I went for some tea across the street, looked around at the Dave Chihuly glasswork in the lobby, daydreamed on the witness bench about marble fountains in ancient Roman civilization and how the Moors and Romans ended up as Spaniards and Italians. Then I was called to speak. I was asked by G. Grantham about the nature of the list and the kind of messages posted. (typical explanation). He asked if I was aware of Jim Bell and his essay on AP, did I enter into the discussions on the subject, and what was my opinion on the matter ("I disagreed"). Several questions on Toto's posts: I considered them performance art, satirical, joking [etc], the kind of creative stories a writer would post, didn't read them all, didn't take them very seriously. Did I know about the AP bot web page. I did, but didn't read most of those messages, didn't look at the site, didn't seriously consider that such a bot was up and functional. What was my reaction on seeing the particular post with the header containing my name : Wasn't sure if it was really a "Toto" post; was puzzled and surprised by it, being very different from his typical style. And you didn't want your name associated with it? Correct. Outside of the context of list discussions such a message could easily be misconstrued and misunderstood. So you thought it was unwise for someone to send out this kind of post? I thought it was foolish. Then CJ brought up a question about whether I had received a couple of other emails from him, which I could not recall. He began a second question, but Judge Bryan would not allow him to continue (don't remember what the issue was, but my impression is that he was tired of hearing anymore about who sent or received which messages from who.) Judge Bryant then asked me, "So you,ve never met Carl Johnson, have you?" No. "Well , " - he casually waved his hand in CJ's direction - "there he is." (laughter). CJ pointed to Gene Grantham beside him and said "And this is Toto." Then the Dark Side got up and inquired about the message which I posted here the other day (in the reply to Hettinga's "Osama Tim Laden" post). It was on the ledge in front of me, in the 2nd big, fat binder full of Toto's and cpunk email, exhibit #25. "Are those little doohickeys on the side Toto's statements?" " And the other part of the message is what you said?" He started to ask me about what I thought about something, but the judge intervened. This judge reminded me of a teacher, or Judge Judy Watkins, saying to the prosecutor, "You don't ask the witness whether they agree with your statement. You ask them about the content of the message. We're talking about fundamental content here, not whether she agrees with you or not." Basically he then inquired whether I thought the message would be taken seriously by Billg & company. No. Like I said in the message, I expected they would just keep it on file but not pursue it. (which is what happened) But I did recognize a message of that type could be misinterpreted or misunderstood? Yes. A few objections went back & forth during all of the questioning, with the judge basically reemphasizing that it was the content that mattered in the communications, not tangential considerations. Then I left the perch and the judge called it a day. I observed as CJ put his hands behind him and cuffs were put on them. He turned back and looked at me; I lifted my hand a bit in greeting & acknowledgement. And that was that. Gene Grantham said he thought tomorrow morning the judge would make his decision. I asked him if he would post a message to the list about it, and/or send something to John Young, and he said he would. .. Blanc p.s. I recognize the extreme & utter importance of haivng a hired gun handy for those special occasions when you're suddenly ambushed by the Matrix, but it ought to be kept in mind, foremost and nevertheless, that it was not I who created the situation, provoking a visit from the AI Agents, wherein in any case I myself was not the target of investigation and would therefore feel less the immediate reaction to hai-karate self-defense (I haven't been through BUMMER). One part to keeping AI Agents away is to prevent from deliberately creating cause for suspicion in the first place, like not waving a red flag in front of them and yelling 'fire'. After that, it's much more difficult to keep them at bay (3 months and $10K? yikes! Better you than me, GilMorpheus <g>). -------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- the moderated mailing list of politics and technology To subscribe: send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with this text: subscribe politech More information is at http://www.well.com/~declan/politech/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------
