This is not just about the power of money.  This is also about the scope of intellectual property rights.  

4-6 month prison sentence for downloading academic journals yet the "Justice"Department refuses to prosecute anyone for the fraud that cost the American people trillions of dollars and threw the country into a depression

Finally some sanity regarding this guy's suicide.  

No one killed this man.  He killed himself.

Joan, respectfully I will submit you probably shouldn't assume what conversations took place or didn't take place between Swartz and his lawyer. The client is ultimately in charge. There very well may have been a discussion around taking the reduced sentence followinga guilty plea. I think the source ofa lot of the criticism stems from the bullying aspects and aggressive tactics which are more about building the personal careers of the prosecutors than about the provision of justice. 

Sorry Boston Globe you can't save her - she is no longer electable- you will have to endorse Tim Murray for governor.

An interesting article and an interesting opinioin.  As to the young man his actions in terms of his life were regrettable.  However I would imagine he was quite pleased with himself over his actions regarding JSTOR and I think he was right.  However, his inability to deal with the results of those actions show a fatal flaw in who he was not some injustice within the prosecuting attorney's office.  Was he worth prosecuting?  Who knows, but I think most of us would have fought it out and played the game to the end.  Apparently the young man for whatever reason couldn't deal with the pressure one tends to think sadly if it wasn't this it would be something else that drove him over the edge.

From Giermond, below:  "I think the source ofa lot of the criticism stems from the bullying aspects and aggressive tactics which are more about building the personal careers of the prosecutors than about the provision of justice."

The idea that prosecutorial discretion's proper purpose can ever include advancing the personal career of the prosecutor to the disadvantage of a defendent is outrageous and people are expressing that outrage in this case and in others where prosecutors have apparently lost any sense that their discretion must always meet a moral test.

Obviously Ortiz didn't kill the young man; that is undeniable.  However her office's behavior may certainly have increased the pressures on him that led him to take his on life.  I don't want her tried for murder; I want her and the assistant she assigned to live out their years troubling over future cases and employing their discretion aware that those they prosecute deserve thoughtful consideration before the "bullying" power is brought into play.

And there there is the question of whether copyright laws are overly broad. The unfortunaly aspect of this case is the prosecution really wasn't advancing any societal issue IMHO but was just protecting an industry and a culture where everything has to have a price. Ultimately this all comes down to Citizens United and money in politics.Commercial interests lobby Congress and give them sinful amounts of money, they pass laws that allow them to make more money. US Attorneys are enforcing a system of legalized a bribery and corruption, Thank you US Supreme Court. Just as the case with King John and the Magna Carta thank God for the jury trial system. Too bad this case didn't go to trial and a jury refused to convict the kid. Although even when a defendant wins they lose after having to endure years of pre trial anxiety and a large legal bill.

Cyber security is a big problem. It is hard to believe that policy decisions in this area are not reviewed by Attorney General Eric Holder's office

The family is greaving an incredible loss. The rest of us should step back and let them have space. Laying blame is not going to undo anything. Let them lash out but don't encourage it. It won't bring him back. He was a kid doing something he thought was cool. And kids often don't think through consequences.

Maybe we need to think about how we teach integrity and the need to balance respect for the law with a healthy questioning of authority.

Very well balanced opion piece.  The MLK letter says it all.  The U.S. Attorney was doing her job and the settlement offer was just.

Was not a "major network breach."

They were told he was a suicide risk. They offered to protect him by throwing him in jail. They didn't have the humanity to see him as a person. That is where they erred. I like to think compassion plays a role in everyone's life at times. Am I a fool?

Henry David Thoreau also went to jail for refusing to pay a poll tax which would support the war with Mexico to which he was opposed. Why didn't Swartz, if he was trying to make a point?

I agree that the attorney was possibly looking for a test case to argue. It is also a good point about paywalls. I pay to be able to read the Globe. The family needs to take some responsibility. According to his girlfriend he was so depressed he could not function. Why did they recognize and seek help for him. Lastly did he know the charges and fine reduced? 

I'm not sure what was in the stored material, whether it was owned by someone, or someone had the rights for distributing it and charged a fee. In any event, hacking into a program or website with intention to take something that lawfully does not belong to you should not be protected, its theft. If you want to be a computer outlaw you have to be ready to pay the piper.

Even if we accept Joan's legal view of the case, a plea bargain that included probabtion instead of jail time would have been far more appropriate for a victimless "crime" involving intellectual property!  Most of which was not even, apparently, under copyright protections.

There is a true unbalance to justice when a brilliant young man is threatened with jail time (yes, bullying) and bankers who launder money face nothing.

I could not disagree more.

When the Government prosecutes a Federal Law against an individual the individual has little to no chance. When the Government prosecutes a Federal Law against a corporation the Government generally settles for cash and a finding of no criminal activity. HSBC laundering drug money (no criminal charges), SEC vs any Wall Street ‘Bank’ these are done are a weekly basis . This is how the system works. The yard stick is how much $ did they get and the criminals repeat the process. US Attorney Ortiz should move to the SEC.

Very jacobyish of you Joan.. 

Why not do a real piece of journalism on where the government has gone...in particular since 9-11. 'We' now through passivity condone the killing of US citizens as well as 'collarterals' by the use of drones without any due process. The abuses we like to condemn J Edgar for are now routine governmental processes. I think the the gun totin loons who see the second amendement as their protection against the government are truly paranoid...however, even in the case of the most bizzare parnoid one can usually find a seed which fed that paranoia, they just took it to obsessive levels...but there was a seed. Without looking up and repeating the whole recitation but adapting it...'they came for the ---- but I was not ------ so I did nothing...they came for the advocates but I had nothing I believed in strongly enough to be an advocate for so I was safe. 'They' never come for the ones who stand for or believe in nothing. We want to prosecute teenagers in western Massachusetts who bully a young woman to death by her own hands, how about those who bully by the mis-use of their power under the guise of just doing their jobs.

Today's comment in the Boston Herald by Ms. Ortiz, "We never intended full penalty for Swartz," is stunning. Ms. Ortiz admits and knew she never intended to go for the full penalty, yet her office held the full penalty over Aaron Swartz's head. Any reasonable person can only interpret her comment as bullying to achieve a result that the US attorney's office wanted, by any means necessary. Isn't that called bullying? And in a January 16, 2011 story by David Boeri, Ms. Ortiz said, “At the time of the indictment, [Ortiz] said, ‘Stealing is stealing.’ I saw that all the time when I was on the bench,” she said. “This is a classic line. Stealing an apple if you’re hungry is different than Bernie Madoff. It is obviously different.” As to "stealing" and Ms. Ortiz' husband's comments concerning Mr. Swartz' lawbreaking, based on my firsthand knowledge, several rogue prosecutors and the Boston FBI office bent over backwards to cover up "truly incredible," public corruption and verified crime at the Defense Contract Management Agency, subsidized by hundreds of millions taxpayer dollars. That's not an "apple." Some of the verified crime (verified by the US attorney's office and the FBI) included retaliatory frame ups, promotion fixing, fraudulent promotional certificates, sexual harassment, rigged investigations, prosecutorial misconduct, well planned discrimination and other violations. With the complicity of the US attorney's office, the perpetrators were well rewarded with quid pro quo promotions, jobs, bonuses and awards. As to my opposition in the retaliatory frame up of an elderly, sickly Hispanic female (and other violations), the chief counsel, Bruce Krasker's response was, "We (the Legal Directorate) can do anything we want. It's called gaming. We can deny, we can delay ...dismiss. We can manipulate the system any way we want." Despite 18 USC 4, which makes it mandatory to report official corruption and government crime, and FBI Director Mueller's high priority on public corruption, on two separate occasions in 2010, the US Marshals Service visited me at my place of employment at the Massachusetts trial court and told me to stop reporting verified official corruption and verified high crime in government to the US Attorney, her subordinate public corruption officer, Brian Kelly and to members of the federal bench or else. On June 16, 2011 I learned that someone at the US attorney's office placed me on a government "watch list." Isn't this bullying? dougkinan@yahoo.com

AMENDED COPY Today's comment in the Boston Herald by Ms. Ortiz, "We never intended full penalty for Swartz," is stunning. Ms. Ortiz admits and knew she never intended to go for the full penalty, yet her office held the full penalty over Aaron Swartz's head. Any reasonable person can only interpret her comment and actions as bullying to achieve a result that the US attorney's office wanted, by any means necessary. Isn't that called bullying? And in a January 16, 2011 story by David Boeri, (Retired Federal Judge Joins Criticism Over Handling Of Swartz Case) Ms. Ortiz said, “At the time of the indictment, [Ortiz] said, ‘Stealing is stealing.’ I saw that all the time when I was on the bench.” “This is a classic line. Stealing an apple if you’re hungry is different than Bernie Madoff. It is obviously different.” As to "stealing" and Ms. Ortiz' husband's comments concerning Mr. Swartz' lawbreaking, based on my firsthand knowledge, several rogue prosecutors and the Boston FBI office bent over backwards to cover up "truly incredible," public corruption and verified crime at the Defense Contract Management Agency, subsidized by hundreds of millions taxpayer dollars. That's not an "apple." Some of the verified crime (verified by the US attorney's office and the FBI) included retaliatory frame ups, promotion fixing, fraudulent promotional certificates, sexual harassment, rigged investigations, prosecutorial misconduct, well planned discrimination and other violations. With the complicity of the US attorney's office, the perpetrators were well rewarded with quid pro quo promotions, jobs, bonuses and awards. As to my opposition in the retaliatory frame up of an elderly, sickly Hispanic female (and other violations), the chief counsel, Bruce Krasker's response was, "We (the Legal Directorate) can do anything we want. It's called gaming. We can deny, we can delay ...dismiss. We can manipulate the system any way we want." Despite 18 USC 4, which makes it mandatory to report official corruption and government crime, and FBI Director Mueller's high priority on public corruption, on two separate occasions in 2010, the US Marshals Service visited me at my place of employment at the Massachusetts trial court and told me to stop reporting verified official corruption and verified high crime in government to the US Attorney, her subordinate public corruption officer, Brian Kelly and to members of the federal bench or else. On June 16, 2011 I learned that someone at the US attorney's office placed me on a government "watch list." Isn't this bullying? dougkinan@yahoo.com

"Overreach by cyber-bullies"? Please. I am about as far from being a cyber-bully as it gets, and I share what seems to be the nearly universal revulsion for the prosecution's actions in this case...or should I say for its failure to engage the one action that might well have precluded Swartz's suicide. And that would be a human and humane reading of the spirit--and not the cold, contextless letter--of the law. We see in the media, day after day, stories that confirm, appallingly, the absence of proportionality in the U.S. justice system, no matter the so-called crime. When "justice" appears to entail anything but justice, how can individuals across the spectrum of society feel anything less than revulsion? This is not overreach: it is the eminently understandable response of conscience and betryed good faith to the arrogance of power.

The only person responsible for Aaron Swartz's suicide is Aaron Swartz.