Bonum Certa Men Certa

The Eric Lundgren Case and Similar High-Profile Plea 'Bargains' (Aaron Swartz and Marcus Hutchins)

Overview



Microsoft's Declaration of War on Recyclers



The Legal Aftermath



Pending review and research




Innocence Is Irrelevant
Reference: Innocence Is Irrelevant



Summary: Unjust and at times fatal plea 'bargain' tricks are being leveraged against people who fight 'the system'; Eric Lundgren has come to realise he's one of these people

The other day we saw Eric Lundgren replying to Marcus Hutchins; it wasn't long after Hutchins had said:

Me: "Now my case is over the stress should subside and i can fina..." My Lawyer: "Just a friendly reminder that you need to pack up your entire apartment, say bye to all your friends, then move across the fucking sea. Sometime this week would be good."


Hutchins will be walking around for the rest of his (long to go!) life with a "felony" crest/emblem/badge/mark/stamp/livery. It's a stain. It'll never go away. It's hard to find employment as in some cases it is not legal to hire people with a conviction/criminal record/felony. He's on the record as admitting guilt only after he had been blackmailed into it with the plea 'bargain' trick/machinations. We mentioned this many times in our daily links over the past couple of years.

“I was watching a documentary called "The Internet's Own Boy - The Story Of Aaron Swartz" - I wish he was still with us... I was glued to the documentary in hopes of gaining some insight that might help my plight. Then the narrator says, "And then he hung himself" and I just sat there dumbfounded...”
      --
Lundgren and Hutchins have that problem in common now. "Before I went to prison," Lundgren told me the other day, "I was watching a documentary called "The Internet's Own Boy - The Story Of Aaron Swartz" - I wish he was still with us..."

"I think I mentioned the similarity to you already," I told him, as "legal bills burdened his family, so he 'saved' them" (by killing himself).

"It was crazy," Lundgren continued, "he got hit with the exact same level of Federal Charges that I was facing and I was so eager to hear how he was going to get out of it! I was glued to the documentary in hopes of gaining some insight that might help my plight. Then the narrator says, "And then he hung himself" and I just sat there dumbfounded..."

And "they do this to other people," I interrupted him to say. "Chelsea Manning is the latest..." (they impose massive daily fines on her and her family for merely refusing to testify against Julian Assange even though she rightly sticks to her Constitutional rights).

"Assange [may] still have some savings," I said, "so I think he can cope with legal bills..."

And "then comes the plea "bargain"," I said. And "the US did this to a Brit too [...] he was released 1-2 weeks ago ("MalwareTech") [...] he has felony now [but] they gave him a "bargain" [of] time served (2 years) [...] after he helped stop the damage caused by Microsoft/NSA back doors (WannaCry)" (this is based on our latest informal conversation).

Here's a report about it, "Marcus Hutchins, malware researcher and ‘WannaCry hero,’ sentenced to supervised release" (NSA and Microsoft officials -- not Hutchins -- should have been sentenced to prison, at the very least for their WannaCry culpability; it's them who made the back doors that caused hospitals to be shut down; their actions actually killed a lot of people).

"How dare this young British man 'interfere' with WannaCry, which was mostly developed by the NSA? Stay out, little fella'! Adults only here!"The above article (from one and a half weeks ago) was written by a former Microsoft UK staffer/intern who had blocked me in Twitter. So it's not likely he'll explain the back doors nature of it all (or Windows). The state wants to 'bury' it all and 'make an example'...

How dare this young British man 'interfere' with WannaCry, which was mostly developed by the NSA? Stay out, little fella'! Adults only here!

WannaCry is an exploit, a back door(ing) facility; it was leaked from the NSA and Microsoft knew about it as it's telling the NSA about zero-days without even fixing them. WannaCry is an SMB-level exploit. It killed lots of people, shut down hospitals worldwide, and caused billions of dollars in financial damage. And guess who was threatened with life in prison for it... the man who stopped it!

“No good deed shall go unpunished, especially if it hurts profit. This world be damned, we'll pollute it if there's a coin to be made outta this.”
      --Anonymous
In the case of Lundgren, who got arrested and was threatened with life behind bars? Not the people responsible for deadly pollution but the person who combats this pollution. As someone put it in response to our article yesterday (Microsoft employees have already 'infiltrated' these comments): "No good deed shall go unpunished, especially if it hurts profit. This world be damned, we'll pollute it if there's a coin to be made outta this."

The following old (but still viral) meme comes to mind as a rather appropriate and apt analogy:

Facebook vs WikiLeaks



There's lots more coming in the series, so stay tuned. The exact structure (outline) hasn't been determined yet. We're thinking along the lines of: 1) Silencing Media (how Microsoft gagged publishers). 2) Court Mischief (how Microsoft possibly 'bought' the outcome). 3) Legal and Financial Ramifications (the dangers of this precedent). Expect photos and legal documents (copies of them). ⬆

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

More Shutdowns at Microsoft, Hundreds of Workers Impacted Shortly
It's not the entire wave, just part of it
 
Intercontinental Brigading - Part XIII - Censorship by All Means Available in a Continent So Far Away, as 'Secure' (Restricted, Restriction by Microsoft) Boot Has a Crisis of Legitimacy
it's about America controlling sites and computers everywhere
Links 24/10/2026: Oligarchs Already Buy US Elections, GAFAM Front Group "EFF" Speaks of "Vulnerability Apocalypse"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 24/10/2026: Automobile Differential Tire Movement, Samsung Washer Woe, and Slop Scraping
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, October 23, 2026
IRC logs for Friday, October 23, 2026
As Usual, Late on a Friday XBox (Microsoft) Releases Evidence of Its Demise
We covered several such Friday announcements earlier this year
Gemini Links 24/10/2026: Break/Fix and OpenStreetMap
Links for the day
Links 23/10/2026: Slop "is Scaling Transnational Repression" and Infringement and DMCA Suits Against Suno/Anthropic (Plagiarism Blenders)
Links for the day
The Register MS: About 60 Mentions of "AI" in One Day Are Paid-for Spam (Sponsored Hype, Composed by the Companies Covered)
The Register MS is a dying site
Links 22/10/2026: MElon (Elon Musk) Election Interference and Perl/Raku Foundation by the Numbers
Links for the day
Techrights Audience Grew as a Function of the Intensity of Attacks on Its Existence
We try to publish fewer stories but better (not necessarily long but at least important) stories
TechRepublic is Becoming a Slopfarm
It seems like TechRepublic became LLM slop (maybe all of it, maybe only some of it for now)
Techrights is Not About GNU/Linux, Tux Machines Is
When we say "GNU/Linux" we emphasise the GNU
The World Needs Activists With Social Skills and Perseverance
An everyday activist makes life better for everybody, everywhere (not for personal gain or even credit)
Intercontinental Brigading - Part XII - Lawfare to Cover Up Microsoft's Restricted Boot Calamity (Microsoft as Authority Over Linux), Garrett Wants to Talk About Penises Instead
When lawsuits become a political weapon
Without Microsoft's Monopoly (and Monopoly Rents) the Inevitable Microsoft Mass Layoffs Carry on Endlessly
Microsoft Windows is not retaining the dominance it once had
IBM's Debt Grew About $2 Billion in 3 Months
The silent layoffs still seem to impact Red Hat
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 22, 2026
IRC logs for Thursday, October 22, 2026
Gemini Links 22/10/2026: Solar MiniBBS, Building Major Tom, and Zig
Links for the day
Links 22/10/2026: Busan’s Celebrity Shark in Canal Again
Links for the day
Links 22/10/2026: "Software Developers Have Been Promoted Into Incompetence"
Links for the day
Intercontinental Brigading - Part XI - Losing Over a Million Pounds (Borrowed Money) to Try to Silence Critics of Restricted Boot With Microsoft-Controlled "Certificates"
Garrett is also very jealous of Daniel Pocock
Links 22/10/2026: eBay to Lay Off a Tenth of Staff (Again), Node.js and PHP Security Crises, Climate News
Links for the day
Red Hat Layoffs Still Going on This Week (Whilst IBM's Debt Grows in Spite of Mass Layoffs)
IBM is bluffing/cheating the shareholders again
IBM's Debt Continues to Increase While the Company Rapidly Shrinks
This is what a dying company looks like
Linux Kernel Needs Diversity and Diversity of Good Code, Not LLM Slop
Linux (and Linus) are kicking a can down the road
Microsoft Shrinks Every Year
Microsoft will try to spin or twist this as "efficiency"
Gemini Links 22/10/2026: Holiday Inn and Emacs
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 21, 2026
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 21, 2026