David Kravets reports:
US federal prosecutors urged a federal appeals court late Monday to keep a child-porn suspect behind bars—where he already has been for seven months—until he unlocks two hard drives that the government claims contain kid smut.
The suspect, a Philadelphia police sergeant relieved of his duties, has refused to unlock two hard drives and has been in jail ever since a judge’s order seven months ago—and after being found in contempt of court. The defendant can remain locked up until a judge lifts the contempt order.
[….]
The suspect has not been charged with any child-porn related crimes, yet he is imprisoned in Philadelphia’s Federal Detention Center for refusing to decrypt two drives encrypted with Apple’s FileVault software in a case that highlights the federal government’s war on encryption. A federal magistrate has ordered him imprisoned “until such time that he fully complies” with the decryption order. The man’s attorney, Federal Public Defender Keith Donoghue, is demanding that the appeals court immediately release his client from prison because he is being “held without charges.” (PDF)
Read more on Ars Technica.
HA! If the…..pervson had nothing to hide, they would let them crawl all over his dives and find nothing. Unfortunately he probably is hiding something. Sick people like this have rights – but if they think the law is there to protect them when a federal magistrate says give it up or else, they are in contempt and has been charged for it. Obviously this….pervson doesn’t have much to do, sitting in a cell watch what little assets they had go away.
Demanding a court to release? Really? Telling the courts what to do is self inflicted suicide and will only make the matters worse. This has CIRCUS written all over it.